


Reverse Chronology

by GlassGoblins



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Everyone will show up eventually - Freeform, Fix-It, Gen, Major Spoilers, Mentions of past abuse, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), getting the teams back together, implied rhodey/tony, implied thorkyrie, its what she deserves, mentions of torture, no romantic relationships other than potential background nebula/mantis, not nebula-centric but a lot of nebula, other relationship and character tags to be added, tho i think we've all seen it by now
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-05-07 01:00:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 27,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14659935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlassGoblins/pseuds/GlassGoblins
Summary: [Major Infinity War Spoilers]After Thanos kills half the universe, the remaining heroes have to find a way to recover.





	1. Departure

**Author's Note:**

> It's not even in reverse chronological order, how pretentious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not even in reverse chronological order, how pretentious.

Tony was vaguely aware of the fact that he was kneeling on the ground, of the stabbing pain in his side, of the ash-covered hand he was holding against his face, of the gentle rocking back and forth of his body. Other than that, there was nothing. He existed somewhere vague, somewhere far off and outside of his body. 

They had lost.There was no other way to look at it. Thanos had beaten them all and killed half the universe. There was no way to fix it. Where the hell was he supposed to go from here? Stranded on an alien planet with the knowledge that he’d failed to prevent the one thing he had been preparing for.

A scream ripped him from his trance.

He whirled around to see the blue cyborg woman from before (what was her name again? Had he ever known?) doubled over, rage twisting her features as she howled at the empty air. It was a strange sound, seeming to rip from her throat. He wondered if the metallic quality was from the sound waves bouncing off the scraps of metal and machinery around them, or if her vocal chords were part robotic too.

She seemed to run out of energy, or air, for screaming. The sound reduced to a whine as she deflated. 

He watched as she dropped to her knees, shoulders slumping in defeat, breathing heavily. 

She seemed distressed, he should say something. But what?

He opened his mouth to speak, but all that came out was a distant choking noise. The woman’s head snapped towards him, and he watched her furiously wipe at her eyes as they met his own. 

“Who the hell are you?” She snarled, voice hoarse.

Again, he opened his mouth to reply but found no voice there. He snapped his mouth shut and stared, as if he’d be able to convey his name by vacantly staring just between her eyes.

She gave an irritated huff, rolling her eyes but saying nothing. They stared apathetically at each other, chests heaving in exhaustion and saying nothing. 

An eternity passed, and no time passed at all before she slowly pulled herself up. It seemed to take a tremendous amount of effort. He watched her start to walk away, distantly aware of the fact that if she left he would be stuck here and this would be the last human (?) interaction before he slowly dehydrated. Though, dehydrating was a bit ambitious. He’d almost forgotten he’d been stabbed. 

Should he try to stop her? He couldn’t see the point. Even if she could get him back to earth, what would he be returning too?

She paused at the pile of ashes he assumed were the remains of the “Guardians of the Galaxy.” (What a silly name. Almost as silly as “Avengers”. God, he hadn’t even seen them before he’d left. How many of them had died? Were any of them left?). A far-off sense of empathy panged at his chest as he watched her stoop down, extending her robotic hand as if to touch the ashes and then drawing back at the last second as if she had been burned.

“Did you come here with them?” She asked.

Tony couldn’t find the energy to reply, so he settled for simply shaking his head.

She turned to face, narrowing her eyes. “Then what are you doing here?”

_Stopping Thanos._ He shrugged hopelessly. _Losing._

“Where’s your ship?” She demanded. “We need to get off this planet.”

Tony pointed to the broken donut ship he’d flown - crashed - in on. The woman’s gaze followed to where he was pointing, and, oddly, recognition flashed briefly across her face.

“Well, we can’t use that.” She muttered.

Tony’s gaze dropped back to the dust piles, the remains of his momentary allies, at her feet. They hadn’t come with him and- 

They hadn’t come with him. Plus, just looking around it was obvious that the planet was uninhabitable, so they couldn’t have been staying here. They must’ve flown in on their own ship, and there was a chance it was still in usable condition. 

“They must’ve left their ship somewhere.” The woman nearly echoed his thought’s, gesturing the the piles of dust at her feet. “Unless Quill crashed it, it should be our best bet to get out of here.”

Quill. She’d called him by name. She must have known them.

“Where are you from?” She asked suddenly, breaking him out of his thoughts.

“Wha-” Tony finally found his voice.

“I’m assuming you aren’t from this planet.” She cut him off, gesturing to the wreckage around them “ I can drop you off wherever you came from before I hunt him down.”

‘Him’ was Thanos, Tony assumed. He doubted she would have any luck. Even if she did hunt him down she’d just failed to do anything with allies, what the hell was she expecting to accomplish alone?

“Earth.” He forced out.

“Ugh.” the woman replied, apparently not the biggest earth fan. “Fine, that’s not too far. Help me find their ship.”

Tony painstakingly forced his body to stand, before his breath caught in his throat.

Earth. Fuck, was there anything left. ‘Half the population of the universe’ didn’t necessarily mean half the population of each individual planet. What if Thanos had wiped everyone from the planet? What if Tony returned only to find a planet of ash? Everyone gone, no Avengers, no Rhodey, no Pepper. Hell, even no Peter’s Aun-

Peter. Peter was dead. The kid had died, begging Tony to save him. He’d wanted to be a hero, and Tony had let him, and now he was dead.

What the hell would he say to May? That was, if she had lived.

Oh god, he couldn’t breath. Fuck, fuck. Of all the times to have a panic attack it had to be here on this strange planet in front of some blue alien who was his only way home. He bent over, placing his hands on his knees and trying to force in breaths.

“Are you dying?” The scratchy voice ripped him from his thoughts, and his head snapped up to see the blue woman staring at him with confusion.

He would have laughed. It certainly felt like he was dying. His lungs burned and his chest ached. His heart pounded against his ribs as if it was trying to burst from his chest. It felt as if he was leaving his body. His mouth hung open making hoarse gasps as he tried to regain control of his breaths, spit dangling from his chin and tears burning his eyes.

Slowly, painfully he regained control of his breathing. He honestly had no idea how long it took. The spacey, distant feeling had returned as if he was lagging behind his own thoughts and movements.

He straightened his posture and lifted his head to look at the woman again. She was still staring at him, but her expression was closed off.

“Are you done?” She asked, not unkindly.

He nodded, the action feeling foggy.

“Alright, come on.” She said, turning once again to find the ship. “I need to get my stuff out of my ship first.”

Fighting through the haze in his mind, Tony followed her wordlessly.

It was nice of her to offer him a ride. He wondered how long it would take them to get to earth. Long enough that she’d realize he didn’t know her name? At what point would it be too weird to ask? Tony followed this train of thought, but made no attempt to talk to her as she led him through the dead orange planet. 

She stopped. He nearly smacked into her. She was standing in front of the small smoking wreck of a ship. He recognized it as the one that she’d crashed into Thanos. The woman casually smashed the windscreen with her metal arm and reached in, pulling a large bag out of the wreckage. She slung the single strap on her shoulder, across her torso, before once again leading Tony away.

He didn’t know how much time passed, or where they went before she led him to a particularly large pile of ruin and immediately began to climb.

“Stay there.” She ordered “I don’t want to have to save you if you fall.”

So she wasn’t the heroic type. He slid into a seated position on the ground. His side was really starting to hurt. He held his right hand against the stab wound in his left side. He’d already filled it in with an antiseptic gauze he’d created to buffer the blood flow, but that was only a momentary fix. He wasn’t a doctor - he’d done more work in engineering, physics and chemistry than biology- so he could only assume that Thanos hadn’t hit any of his internal organs, since he’d probably be dead by now if he had. That didn’t mean he couldn’t aggravate the damage, and if he didn’t get medical help soon enough he’d probably bleed out.

He could die here, he realized tiredly. 

He heard a dull thud as the woman from before jumped back down, landing to his right.

“The ship is that way.” She informed him, pointing behind them with her thumb. “It’s not smoking, so it seems like it should still work.”

Tony used his left hand to push himself up, grunting in pain as his wound flared in protest. He kept his right arm wrapped around himself, as if covering the gash would in any way alleviate his pain.

The woman squinted in suspicion. “What’s up with your side?”

Tony met her eyes, silently debating whether or not he should show her. Eventually he moved his hand away, revealing the stab wound. 

“Thanos.” Was all he could force out in explanation.

She didn’t seem bothered. Actually, she barely seemed surprised. She just nodded, as if that made sense.

Honestly, he was expecting more of a reaction.

“There’s probably medical supplies on the ship.” She said. “Come on.”

Tony wrapped his arm back around himself and followed as she led him to the ship.

The ship was about half the size of the helicarrier. It was orange and grey, and the shape vaguely reminded him of a boomerang. 

The woman yanked the door open, confidently stepping inside. He followed.

Tony blinked, trying to adjust to the amount of clutter inside. He was reminded vaguely of his workshop, if it had been owned by a couple rowdy teenagers. 

The inside of the ship was dark, but there were several coloured light glowing faintly from the control panel at the front of the ship. It was a lot bigger than he thought it would be, with six seats behind what had to be the pilots seat positioned at the front. Behind the seat was a raised section with a table in the middle, compartments covered the back wall and the area was dimly lit with white light. It looked like there was a hallway with rooms to both the right and left of the main area. 

The ship was designed to be lived in.

The woman leaned against the back wall, glowering at him. 

“The bathroom is probably that way.” She pointed to the left hallway. “That’s where I’d guess they keep any medical supplies.”

“Have you been on this ship before?” Tony asked her.

She shook her head. “Not this one. It’s an M-class ship though, and they all have the same basic design.”

M-class? Evidently that meant something to her. Tony wondered just how much knowledge was universal to everyone but earth. 

Tony wandered down the hall. He didn’t know which room was the bathroom so he opened every door. 

The first door on the left was a bedroom. It was relatively bare, the only signs of life being a long brown leather jacket draped over a chair in front of a desk pressed against the right wall, and the slightly ruffled sheets on the unmade bed. Tony shut the door, not wanting to pry in a dead person’s room. 

The first door to the right was another bedroom, like the other one it was almost empty. Unlike the other room, the bed was made and there was a tiny potted plant that vaguely resembled a succulent of some kind on the desk opposite to the bed.

The next door he opened revealed another bedroom, there were snack wrappers filling a garbage can and the bed was unmade. Tony closed that door as well. 

The next room was empty save for a desk and unfilled bed frame. 

Finally, Tony found the bathroom. It was shockingly normal. A sink with a cabinet underneath, a tub with a showerhead, and a toilet. There was a medicine cabinet with a mirror on the wall above the sink, Tony opened it to look for medical supplies. All he found was a few rolls of gauze, and some rubbing alcohol. That wasn’t going to do anything that he hadn’t already done. Shit.

At the very least he could wash his hands and clean around the wound. He turned the tap on the sink and stuck his hands under the ice cold water that came out, staring numbly as the ash washed down the drain.

Oh god, the ash. His stomach dropped as he furiously scrubbed his hands together, a whine building in the back of his throat as he choked back tears. 

He grabbed the soap, breathing heavily through grit teeth. He absolutely would not have a second panic attack on this godforsaken planet.

Once his hands were clean, he grabbed a cloth from the cabinet under the sink and soaked it under the tap. He wrung the water out until the cloth was just damp instead of dripping wet, then rubbed it into the soap bar.

He let his suit retreat into the his arc reactor, and peeled his jacket and shirt off, groaning in pain as it aggravated the wound in his side. 

“Terran, are you dead?” He heard the woman call out, her voice drawing close with loud footsteps.

Terran?  
“My name is Tony.” He told her as she appeared in the doorway, seeming more irritated than concerned. “I don’t know yours though, what is it?”

“Nebula.” She informed him, her eyes flicked to the expose gash in his side. “That looks bad.”

“Thanks.” He grumbled. “All they have is gauze and rubbing alcohol.”

Nebula peered into the cabinet. “Yeah, they probably used up anything else they had.”

“You knew them, didn’t you?” Tony semi-asked.

“Is that wound fatal for Terrans?” Nebula brushed the question aside. Fair, he didn’t want to talk about the people he knew who’d-

Anyways.

“Probably.” He admitted tiredly.

“Hm.” Nebula hummed. “What’s in it?”

“Huh?” Tony raised an eyebrow. She pointed to the white adhesive from the suit that he’d sealed the wound with.

“Oh.” Tony realized. “It’s a uh…. It’s like an antiseptic gauze adhesive, it’s meant to momentarily uh….” The words were gone. His head was oddly light.

“Close wounds?” Nebula finished for him.

Tony nodded, leaning against the sink. The pain was really kicking in now, he must have run out of adrenaline. 

“It hasn’t stopped the blood flow, has it.” She stated more than asked.

Tony shook his head. “Buffers it.” He hissed through gritted teeth.

“You’re dying.” Nebula declared. “Wait here.”

Tony watched her purposefully leave the room. Once her footsteps had faded to an acceptable distance, he let himself slide down the sink and onto the floor. He rested his head against the bottom of the cool basin, closing his eyes and listening to the clattering noises coming from the room Nebula had disappeared to.

He heard footsteps approaching once again as Nebula appeared in the doorway.

“What are you doing?” She demanded, sounding annoyed.

“Resting.” He mumbled, opening his eyes too look at her.

Nebula was holding eight strange metal boxes, and a roll of sturdy tape. She knelt on the floor beside him, and placed the items on the ground. She placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him slightly.

“Lean against the tub.” She ordered.

He did. She picked up one of the boxes in one hand, and the roll of tape in the other. She roughly placed the cube on his ribs, just to the right of the wound. She held it there with one hand, and used her other to rip some tape off of the roll with her teeth. 

“What are you doing?” Tony asked, feeling a faint panic as she began to tape the cube on.

“These should” Nebula started, picking up a second cube and placing it below the first. “keep the wound in stasis. It won’t heal the wound, just keep it in the same state as it is now.”

“Huh. Neat.” Tony muttered. “Where’d you get those?”

“One of Thanos’ ships.” She informed him, taping the second cube. “Thought they’d be useful.”

Tony could tell she wasn’t telling him something. She was trying very hard to seem detached, but he could sense her discomfort each time she picked one up.

He decided not to pry.

She placed two more cubes on the left side of his wound, parallel to the other two, before ordering him to turn around and taping the remaining four around the exit wound in a mirror image to the one’s on his front.

“Done.” She informed him. 

He groaned, turning to face her again. “You sure this is safe?”

She shrugged “It probably won’t kill you.”

Great. Well, if he died he died. 

She flipped a switch on the four boxes on his front. Tony watched in surprise as blue electricity shot from each of the boxes, connecting to each other across the gash in his side. There was a sudden painful numbing in the area they surrounding.

“What the fuck.” He muttered in awe.

Nebula simply made a spinning motion with her finger, motioning for him to turn around. He did, and soon felt the numb feeling spread through his skin and take hold of the entire left side of his torso.

“Thanks.” He said, again turning to face her.

“Put your shirt back on.” She ordered, ignoring him and pulling said shirt down from the rim of the sink and tossing it to him.

Tony obeyed wordlessly, suddenly too tired to protest.

“If you pass out on the floor I’m not moving you.” She informed him, standing and walking out of the bathroom without a second glance.

Tony rested his head back against the tub, and gave himself a moment to gather his thoughts. Once he got to earth, he’d find what was left of the Avengers and they’d figure out where to go from there. He wouldn’t have time for worrying about any past drama with Rogers.

If he was still alive.

Tony took a deep breath. Maybe gathering his thoughts wasn’t the best plan after all. Slowly, he stood and wandered back to the main area of the ship. Nebula was sitting in the pilot’s seat.

“It’s time to get off this stupid planet.” She grumbled, strapping herself into the seat. 

Tony quickly did the same, sitting in the chair behind her and to her left. “How long should it take to get to earth?” 

“A day.” She replied “And there’s no food on the ship, so I hope you ate before you left.”

“Is there water?” he asked, just now noticing how dry his mouth was.

She turned her head, squinting at Tony’s face. “How long can Terrans survive without water?”

“Two to three days.” Tony replied.

She let out an annoyed grunt, turning away from him again and kicking open a compartment by her feet. Five silver pouches fell out. Tony estimated each one held a cup and a half of water, he also assumed she’d been saving them for whatever trip she had planned for herself next.

“Thanks.” Tony muttered, leaning over in his seat and carefully picking a pouch up from the ground, leaving the other four. The pouch had a twist cap on the top, it reminded Tony of the juice pouches parent’s would pack for their kids. He unscrewed the cap and took a few gulps of water.

It tasted like the best damn thing he’d ever had. He’d had no idea how thirsty he was, and before he knew it he had downed the whole pouch. He swallowed the last of the water, gasping for air as he remembered to breath.

Nebula was giving him a disgusted look.

“Was thirsty.” Tony explained pathetically.

“I can see that.” She replied dryly, turning back to the control panel. She flipped a few switches, and Tony felt the ship’s engine hum to life. A few moments later, they were in the air. 

Exhausted, Tony leaned his head back in his seat. He closed his eyes and let himself drift off as they left the planet’s atmosphere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any and all feedback appreciated! Tell me what you hated, what you liked, or nothing at all! It's like a choose your own adventure.
> 
> This fic isn't a Tony fic, these two are just the farthest physically from the other avengers so I had to get them back before anything else can happen.
> 
> EDIT (4/20/2019): I'm going back and editing old chapters, if you're reading this I promise a new chapter is on it's way!


	2. Garden of the Galaxy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a minute

Piloting was so goddamn boring. It was just sitting in a stupid, uncomfortable chair staring at nothing and occasionally turning left or right. Or, if she was really lucky, another ship would decide to try and kill her and she’d have to swerve madly and try to stay on the offense or escape. At this point, Nebula was pretty sure she’d spent half her adult life piloting some ship that she would inevitably crash to carry out failed revenge missions. 

Nebula imagined piloting was better if you had a co-pilot, someone to take shifts with you or offer conversation. Tony was the first person to be flying with her since she’d helped Ronan. Unfortunately, he was unconscious and probably had no idea how to get them where he was going.

He was also definitely dying. 

Nebula had no idea if those stasis cubes would keep Tony alive or not.They had been used on her so that Thanos could torture her without worrying about killing her. So she couldn’t imagine they had been made with her long-term well-being in mind. She had no idea if she would eventually suffer from side-effects, much less what they would do to someone much weaker like Tony. 

Whatever, not her problem if he died. 

Though, she would rather not be left on this ship alone. So far she was doing a very good job of not thinking about the fact that her dead sister and her stupid dead friends had lived on this shi-

Fuck. Nebula grit her teeth, trying not to think about how she’d only just gotten her sister back, how they were only just starting to talk again, how they hadn’t even had a chance yet to do regular sister things (whatever those were). She took a deep breath and tried not to think about how sweet Mantis had been even though she’d known nothing about her, how much she smiled, how warm her smile had bee-

The Terran- Tony- gasped awake, snapping her out of her thoughts. 

“You dying?” She asked, not taking her eyes off of the windshield in front of her.

The gasps continued, and when he didn’t respond Nebula turned to look back at him. 

Tony’s eyes were wide and wild, he was pale and sweating and very determinedly taking deep shaking breaths through his nose. He looked terrible, but not worse physically than before.

“Nightmare?” She stated as a question, raising an eyebrow. Her voice sounded more annoyed than she’d meant for it too. Whatever.

He gave a quick nod in response, squeezing his eyes shut and continuing with the same breaths as before.

Nebula turned back to the windshield. “Yeah, that’ll happen.” 

Tony let out a breath that might have been a dry laugh. “Are we close?”

“Another few hours and we’ll get there.” She informed him.

“How fun.” He muttered sarcastically, letting out a groan that Nebula assumed meant he was stretching. “Do you want to get some rest? I can take over if you want.”

And be left alone with her thoughts? “No.” 

“You sure?” He sounded confused. “I mean, I can shout out to you if something goes wrong, you must be sick of piloting by now.”

“I’m positive.” She replied through grit teeth. “Besides, you don’t know how to fly an M-Ship.”

Tony must have realized not to push on the rest thing, because there was a long pause before he spoke again. “What’s an M-Ship?”

“Hm?” Nebula asked, not sure if she had heard right.

“That’s the second time you’ve called this ship that.” Tony explained “But I still don’t know what an M-Ship is.”

God, Terrans were so ignorant. “It’s this class and design of ship. They’re used by the Ravagers mostly.”

“Right.” He replied. There was another pause, and she assumed he was processing the information. “Who are the Ravagers? Are they like the Guardians?”

She closed her eyes, and huffed out a breath. “Not exactly.” She informed him through grit teeth. “They’re pirates. The Guardians were more… hero types.”

“Huh.” Was all the reply she got. “Space pirates.”

There was a - wonderful, and much needed- beat of silence, before Tony apparently felt it was necessary to speak again.

“How did you know them? The Guardians, that is.”

“Do Terrans always ask so many questions?” She snapped, jaw clenched so tight she thought it might fuse.

“Only if they want answers.” He retorted, but thankfully dropped the topic.

The Guardians. What a stupid name. To be fair, they were all idiots. She had no idea why Gamora was- Nebula stiffened. 

Had all been idiots.

Her breath caught in her throat.

They were dead. Gamora was dead.

Nebula let out a hiss, her grip on the steering wheel tightened. She didn’t want to think about this. Neither driving or her stupid possibly dying co-pilot were providing her with a distraction. 

“On second thought,” She started evenly “I’m going to take you up on that offer.”

“Pardon?” Tony asked from behind her.

She unbuckled her seatbelt and stood. “I’m taking a break. The ship’s on autopilot. Watch the windshield and call for me if you see anything.”

“Oh,” Tony was scrambling to unbuckle his seatbelt as well. “Yeah, sure.”

She nodded and quickly left the room.

There had to be something on this stupid ship to distract her.

She took the right hallway and opened the door to the first room she came across.

It was a bedroom. It was also a mess.

“Quill, what the fuck.” She whispered.

The room was obviously his. Not just because she doubted that anyone else would be able to make such a mess, but because she could see one of his stupid terran music players lying in a tangle of headphones on his desk - along with a horrifying amount of crinkled wrappers and snack bags. The garbage can was overflowing, and one of his ridiculous wrinkled red jackets was half hanging off the desk chair. The bed hadn’t been made, and the cover sheets were starting to peel off the mattress. 

Nebula wrinkled her nose and the distinct smell of dirty laundry and closed the door. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, leaning her forehead against the doorframe. 

Her arms felt heavy, and her thoughts felt thick and clouded. Her body screamed to drop to the floor and not get up again. Besides, she was pretty sure that there was an extra room or two on the ship. Not that it mattered since there was no one left to care if she stole their room.

“Maybe I should get some sleep.” She muttered to no one, forcing her eyes open again. 

She let out a groan and made herself walk down the hallway in search of somewhere to sleep. The next door she opened revealed yet another cluttered bedroom. Less messy, and mostly tech. Rocket’s room. She closed the door and tried the next one. 

Fuck, and she’d thought Quill was bad. Dead branches covered almost every inch of space. There was clutter everywhere and Nebula couldn’t even tell what half of it was. Wrinkling her nose in disgust, she closed the door. 

Nebula peered down the hallway at the long row of remaining doors, feeling dread build in her gut. She didn’t feel like keeping up this annoying trend of intruding on dead people’s bedrooms. Maybe the other hallway would give her better luck.

She turned on her heel and quickly marched past the cockpit and down the left hallway, ignoring the look Tony threw her over his shoulder. She opened the first door to her right.

For a second, she thought it was a spare room and nearly melted with relief. The bed was perfectly made, as if it had never been used, and there wasn’t a sign of life.

Then she saw the plant.

Nebula cautiously approached the desk it sat on, peeking at the vaguely-familiar little plant. It had small green leaves, spiraling out of the center of it’s tiny pastel yellow ceramic pot. The leaves were a rounded triangular shape, and a soft medium-light green. It was the kind of plant that rarely needed watering- weekly if she remembered correctly. Not that she knew much about plants. She hadn’t known that any of the Guardians did either, they had never given her the impression that they could keep themselves alive- much less a plant. 

She decided that it must be Mantis’ room.

She reached towards the plant, pausing for a second as she reconsidered before gently poking the soil. It was bone dry. 

She would water it, she decided, and then she would find somewhere to sleep.

Quietly she left the room, carefully closing the door, and made her way to the kitchen area.

She grabbed a cup, and then paused to consider her options.

The ship was low on water. There was the water from the taps- but that came from a tank that could be jeopardized at any moment by some stray gunfire. Besides, the tank itself wasn’t exactly full. The only other water that she knew of was from the pouches she’d given Tony earlier. And while he had only taken one, that still didn’t leave her with a lot for when she left again to hunt down Thanos and she wasn’t fond of the idea of sharing it with a plant.

“This is stupid.” Nebula muttered, turning on the tap and filling the cup. It wasn’t as if this ship was the only place in the galaxy with water. She could get more. At least enough to get her to Thanos. And if she didn’t have enough to get back then so be it.

She made a mental note to stop for water after dropping the Terran off. 

She re-entered Mantis’ room and silently walked to the plant. 

“Didn’t know she was a gardner.” Nebula told the plant softly, tilting the glass to allow some of the water to fall. A slow trickle hit the soil around the base of the plant, and a few drops slid down the side of the glass- missing the pot and hitting the desk. She wiped them off with her sleeves, gently laying the glass back down.

She poked the soil once again, just to make sure she hadn’t given the plant too much or too little to drink. Satisfied, she nodded and left for the door.

She gave the plant one last look before leaving the room.

Letting out a sigh, she walked to the room across from herself and pushed open the door- determined to rest.

She froze at the sight of a familiar jacket.

Her heart was in her throat and something was coiling in her chest. She was frozen in place staring at the stupid jacket with wide eyes like a fool. She forced a shaky breath into her lungs, discreetly wiped her palms on her pants and strode towards the jacket- swiping it off the chair in one swift swoop of the hand. She brought it to her face, twisting the brown leather beneath her fingers as she examined it- as if she hadn’t seen it before, as if she didn’t know exactly who it belonged to.

A pressure was building up behind her eyes. She tore her gaze away from the jacket and let it fall on the next most interesting object in the room, the bed. 

She observed it clinically as she approached. The bed was mostly made, except for the top sheet which was slightly rumpled closer to the pillow. That kind of sloppiness would never be allowed while living Thanos, any sign of slacking would have been punished. Her vision blurred, blending the whites of the sheets and pillows into one smear. She carefully sat on the edge of the bed and gently lowered herself until she lay on the crumpled sheets, feeling the pillow beneath her eyes dampen.

“Sister,” Nebula’s voice sounded tight even to her ears. “You’ve gotten lazy.”

The tension in her chest burst from her mouth in an ugly sob. She clenched her teeth together and squeezed her eyes shut, breathing forcefully and furiously willing away her tears.

This was stupid. Crying was stupid. Thanos would have never let her cry. It was weak and pointless and loud, and it wasn’t going to do anything. It wasn’t going to bring her sister back. Gamora was dead, that was it. So there was no point acting like a ba-

A wail tore from her throat. She turned into her side, pulling her limbs against herself as if making herself smaller would protect her from the grief. The sobs wracked her body, mechanical parts protesting the sudden jolts with soft screeches. 

Nothing, except maybe her grief, lasts forever. The wailing faded to sobs faded to sniffs faded to her staring blankly at the wall, not bothering to close her mouth from it’s long-departed silent scream of grief. She had forgotten that it was possible to be exhausted into sleep from crying.

She hadn’t cried that hard since Thanos had taken her. Mostly because the few times she had cried in his custody had ended in him threatening to take her tear ducts. 

The pillow beneath her cheek was uncomfortable wet. The salt from her tears burnt her skin, and she could feel the pillow beneath her chin had grown damp from drool. 

She felt pathetic. Gamora would have scoffed at her in this state.

Gamora might have hugged her. 

She couldn’t cry again. She took several shaky breaths through her nose before pulling the jacket close to her chest. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend she was hugging her sister and not some stupid scrap of fabric. She focused on the mechanical whir of her controlled breaths, pushing aside any thoughts of Thanos or grief. The tug of exhaustion and despair from her crying was growing harder to ignore. She slipped into sleep, still clutching the only thing she had left of her sister.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter took so long and I don't even like it. 
> 
> Sorry to post filler for the second chapter, I wanted to write some Nebula stuff before the rest of the fic happens. I promise the next chapter will actually have earth.
> 
> EDIT (4/20/2019): I'm going back and editing the past chapters before I upload the new one. This fic was written over the course of a year so i'm trying to keep the style and quality more consistent. If you're reading this, a new chapter is on it's way!


	3. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shuri wakes in the aftermath of the battle against Thanos

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .... okay so in my defense university is a lot more work than summer break.

Shuri woke with the immediate sense that something had gone very wrong. She also woke with a dull pain in her head. 

Groaning, she pulled herself into a sitting position and surveyed her surroundings. Fear clenched in her chest.

Vision was gone.

Shit, shit. She stood, looking wildly around for any sign of the android - and even more importantly the infinity stone he’d had. Neither were anywhere to be found.

The window was broken. Hopefully, he had used it to escape. He could fly, couldn’t he? What if he hadn’t escaped? What if Thanos’ men had gotten him, and gotten the stone. That was the Avenger’s last plan, if it had failed, if Thanos had won all because she wasn’t _fast_ enough… 

No. These thoughts weren’t helpful. She just had to assess the damage since she’d been knocked out. If she could identify the problem, she could find the solution. Maybe he had escaped. She just had to check the window.

She approached it cautiously. She didn’t want to rush in and be ambushed by some unseen soldier in the shadows. 

When she made it out into the open without anyone jumping out at her, she deemed it safe enough to run the rest of the way to the window.

The first thing that hit her was the silence. She had only been in one battle as Wakanda was a peaceful nation, but she was positive they were supposed to be… louder. All she could hear was the wind.

Looking out the window into the grounds below, she could see no battle. Sure, there was evidence of a fight, but she didn’t see anyone fighting at the moment. Maybe the palace wasn’t a priority. The main battle was supposed to be much farther away, after all. Maybe Vision had gone to join the main fight.

That would be bad. Very bad, in fact. Shuri was the only one who could remove the stone without killing him. 

She had to go. She had to find Vision and finish her work. If she could just get to him in time, they would be able to stop Thanos.

She whirled around to leave the room, but stopped.

She was alone. Why was she alone? T’Challa would have never let her be unprotected during a battle, especially not while handling the incredibly powerful artifact their enemies were looking for. There had been a Dora with her before… Shuri was sure she'd seen her fall before she was knocked unconscious herself. 

But no one was there. Just Shuri, a lab thrown in disarray, and a pile of dust by the door.

Wait. 

Her heart stopped.  
By the door… that was where the Dora had been. That was where Shuri had seen her fall. And she had health and safety standards for her lab, there certainly hadn’t been a large pile of dust laying in the middle of her floor.

She fled the room. She had to get out onto the battlefield, had to get proof that her dread was unfounded.

She almost crashed into one of the Dora Milaje as she burst through the doors.

“Ayo?!” Shuri cried hands flying up to grab the woman's arms “Are you alright? What happened? Where's Vision?”

Ayo didn't respond. She stood in front of Shuri silently shaking her head and staring in numb shock at the ground. Shuri followed her gaze to see a pile of dust lying on the floor, same as the one in the lab. Her stomach began to knot. 

“Ayo,” she repeated slowly, fearfully. “what happened?”

“She was right there.” Ayo spoke numbly “She was right there, and then she wasn't.”

Panic flared in Shuri's chest. Her heart beat against her sternum as if it was trying to break free. She let go of Ayo, taking a step back.

“I'll be right back.” She heard herself say, breaking into a run towards where she'd been told the main battlefield would be.

She burst onto the battlefield and froze.

The fighting had stopped. She saw no armies, no invading alien forces. The only people she could see were her own. All standing in confusion, falling to their knees in grief, or lying dead and dying on the ground.

She felt her breath catching in her throat. Her face and stomach burned, her heart pounded. She looked wildly around for any sign of the invaders, or the Avengers, or her _brother_.

Not a sign of them, no matter which direction she looked. She willed her feet too move, to carry her blindly in whatever direction she chose.  
She couldn’t comprehend the scenery flying past her as she frantically searched for her brother.

He was fine, of course. T’challa was _fine_ he would always be _fine_. She had built him that suit to protect against anything, there was no way he was-

He was fine. She would find him.

She stumbled through some bushes, nearly falling to her feet. Catching her balance, her gaze finally fell on the Avengers. They were gathered in an informal circle, surrounded by ash with their shoulders slumped in defeat.

“What happened?” She demanded, looking from face to face as if everything would be explained by their shocked expressions.

In a way it was, but desperately she hoped she was wrong.

“We lost.” It was Rogers who spoke.

No. Her heart beat hard against her throat, blocking her breath. 

“What?” She felt the words leave her lips.

“Thanos.” Thor - when did he get here?- told her numbly. “He got the infinity stones. He wiped out half the universe.”

“Turned them to ash.” Banner spoke softly from his machine.

That didn’t make sense. That wasn’t supposed to happen. They were supposed to destroy the Soul Stone, they were supposed to stop Thanos.

They weren’t supposed to lose, half the universe wasn’t supposed to die.

Shuri blinked staring at the ash on the ground. Piecing together their words she realized with a numb shock that she was staring at one of their fallen allies.

Her head snapped up, scanning the area with newfound urgency. Her brother, she still hadn’t found him. Her suit could protect against a lot but not-

“Where’s T’Challa?” She asked, voice high.

Rogers gave a small shrug, shaking his head. Shuri stumbled back, whirling around to search the terrain behind her.

“Brother?!” She called, hating the way her voice cracked. She listened to her own voice ring across the clearing, waiting - praying- for a response.

None came. Her breath hitched.

“I’ll - I’ll be back.” She said absently, breaking into a run without giving the Avengers a second glance.

Shuri burst through the bushes and onto the main battle field. She spun around, looking around for any familiar faces in the dazed crowd. The world was silent, the only sound was her frantic heart beating in her ears. She took a deep breath to calm herself, and nearly choked on the ash filling the air.

A wave of nausea hit her as she realized that was all that remained of someone she probably knew. She stumbled, nearly falling over, and found a pair of strong arms steadying her.

She raised her gaze to see a familiar face. Relief flooded through her as she recognized the, thankfully alive, man in front of her.

“M’Baku!” She cried with joy, grabbing his arm. Thankful that he, at least, was still alive. 

The joy faded quickly to panic as she remembered who she had originally been looking for.

“Have you seen my brother?” She asked urgently.

He shook his head. “No, but Shuri...”

He trailed off, making no attempt to continue the sentence. She knew what he was going to say. It wasn’t cruel, he only wanted to prepare her for the worst case. But still, it seemed he couldn’t bring himself to say it. Good. She refused to hear it anyways. She let go of him and thanked him absently as she returned to her search.

But she didn’t know _where_ to search. All she could see around her were vaguely-familiar warriors searching for their own loved ones, grey ash filling the air. There were also the bodies, but her stomach turned at the thought of searching for her brother among them.

The sounds of voices crying out in grief or shouting the names of unfound friends and family filled the air. She tried to listen for her brothers voice, but couldn’t pick it out in the overwhelming cacophony. 

She wanted to cry. She couldn’t give up yet. T’Challa had to be out there. He was probably just helping out the injured, or helping someone find their loved ones. He’d always been compassionate like that, it wouldn’t be unlike him to immediately get lost in helping those around him after a battle.

“Shuri!” A familiar voice cried out in relief. Shuri spun around to find herself being pulled into a hug. “You’re safe.”

The arms around her were familiar, safe. She let her head rest against the shoulder of the Dora Milaje uniform, returning the hug and drawing comfort from the steady presence. Okoye was alive, everything was going to be okay. She just needed to find her brother.

“Okoye.” Shuri looked up to her, noting the fresh tear tracks on her cheeks. “Have you seen T’Challa?”

Shuri’s stomach dropped as Okoye’s face fell. The older woman’s lip began to tremble, and she pursed her lips as if to stop the movement.

“Shuri-” The way Okoye’s voice shook was the final nail in the coffin.

“No.” She muttered, stumbling back. Okoye grabbed for her arms, frantically muttering reassurances as if just by telling Shuri everything was alright it would be. 

A sob escaped her lips. Shuri pushed against Okoye weakly before being caving into the gentle hug. Her shoulders shook with such force that it felt like her ribs might break. Her sobs seemed to tear themselves from her lungs without her permission. She clung desperately to Okoye’s shoulders, wailing as if screaming out her pain would finally make it stop.

She buried her face into Okoye’s shoulder and let her grief tear itself from her body in frantic sobs until she felt she couldn’t breathe anymore. Okoye held her for as long as it took for her sobs to fade to soft occasional hiccups. Shuri could hear Okoye’s uneven breaths as she cried silently. She realized belatedly that Okoye was trying to keep her grief under control for Shuri’s sake, and tightened her grip on the older woman.

Neither of them spoke. Neither of them moved. They sat in silence on the ash covered ground, clinging to each other through their sudden grief. 

Shuri knew tomorrow she would have to lead. The burden of the throne would fall to her the way it was never supposed to during her lifetime. Her father was supposed to live long enough for T’Challa to have a child, T’Challa was supposed to live long enough for his child to become an adult and lead Wakanda with just as much grace and kindness as her brother. Shuri was supposed to dedicate her life to furthering scientific discoveries and being a teasing younger sister.

But now she was going to have to be Queen. Tomorrow she would have to go through coronation. She would complete the ceremony and her people would be looking to her for guidance. Tomorrow she would have to sit with a council of grief-stricken leaders, possibly new and possibly old, and tell them how she planned to lead Wakanda out of losing over half their population in one day. She would have to stop being a grieving 18 year old mourning the loss of a second family member in three years, and take on the responsibility of an entire nation. She would have to deal with other nations begging Wakanda for help they may no longer have the resources to grant after a world-wide catastrophe. She would have to shoulder a burden of such a scale no Queen or King before her had face. She would have to grow beyond her own pain in the span of one day.

But for today she was weeping teenager. And for now she let Okoye stroke her hair as she wondered how she was meant to lead a nation without her brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Sorry to vanish for months and come back with a filler chapter. Im 100% not satisfied with how this chapter turned out, but at this point it was put up a chapter i hated or abandon the fic entirely so.
> 
> I have already started chapter 4 and it WILL get back to the plot! It will also be another Shuri chapter because I wound up having to break what was going to be one big chapter into two smaller ones just so that the story flowed better. This chapter technically doesnt do much for the plot but it felt necessary to let Shuri deal with things the same way other characters are getting to.
> 
> EDIT (5/5/2019): I FINALLY edited this chapter into something more readable. Any new readers: be glad you didn't have to read the original. I'll have the newest chapter up within the week.


	4. Arrival

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With T'Challa gone, Shuri has to deal with the burden of the throne.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout out to Sam for reading through this chapter for me!!!!

Her mother was alive, at least. That was her only consolation as she prepared for her coronation. Nakia too, she’d arrived in Wakanda only hours after the battle. 

As it was now, exactly a day later, her mother was helping her get ready for her coronation. 

“At least you don’t have to wear the corset this time.” Her mother joked weakly. Shuri didn’t respond, and elected to instead lean her head against her mother’s shoulder. 

“I know.” Ramonda sighed shakily, wrapping her arms around Shuri and rubbing her back.

Shuri took deep shaky breaths, bringing her arms up to hug her mother. She was painfully aware of the fact that they were each others only surviving family. 

“I can't do this.” Shuri sobbed into her mother's shoulder.

“You can.” Ramonda told her firmly, pulling out of the hug and wiping Shuri's tears with the hand not still on her shoulder. “But you won't have to do this alone. You have me and Okoye.”

Shuri closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and willing the pressure in her throat to go away. She gave herself a moment to collect herself, to allow herself some private comfort before being officially expected to lead her country. 

“Okay.” She said, opening her eyes and meeting her mother’s gaze. She gave a firm nod, more to encourage herself than her mother. “Let’s go.”

Her mother gave her a sad smile, cupping Shuri’s face in her hands and pressing a quick kiss to her forehead before straightening up. She nodded to Shuri, indicating to her that it was time to head to the coronation.

The coronation came and went without much disruption, but with a great deal less celebration than her brother’s. This time, not only was Wakanda mourning the loss of their king but of several of their people as well. Okoye had given her a small smile as Shuri had taken her place in the pool, but otherwise kept a steely gaze. She may not have been related to them by blood, but Okoye had always been a second sister to their family - Shuri wasn't the only one mourning her brother. 

Echoing the events of her brother’s coronation, the Jabari arrived halfway through the challenging portion. For a moment, Shuri tensed. M’Baku had grown closer to her brother during his brief reign, they had almost repaired the rift between the Jabari and the rest of Wakanda. But Shuri was not her brother, and while her and M’Baku had been friendly, she wasn’t entirely sure if they were friends. 

She also wasn’t entirely sure if him challenging would be so bad - maybe she wouldn’t have to bear the burden of the throne. 

“The Jabari tribe,” M’Baku announced “will not be challenging today.”

Shuri nearly wept. 

The coronation finished without any further interruptions.

She would not be visiting the ancestral plane today, the heart-shaped herb had not yet grown back. That hadn’t been a problem last week, no one had thought they’d need it. Shuri had never imagined she would need it. Now that she did, she desperately wanted the chance to use it - to see her brother again.

But Wakanda had more important things to discuss. Like what on earth they could do after the recent catastrophe. 

Shuri sat amongst the council on a throne that felt too big. 

“So,” Shuri started carefully “in light of… recent events, what does the council suggest Wakanda should do to move forward?”

“What do you think?” The gentle prompt came from the elder of the merchant tribe.

“Well,” Shuri said, thinking it over “in terms of damage control we can either focus on Wakanda for the time being, or start offering aid to our surrounding countries. Either way, we are going to need to know how many of our people have been killed, and which emergency services are short on staff. I’d recommend we start offering emergency medical training to civilians so that we will have a fall back until we can hire new medical staff to take the place of those who died in the snap.” 

“I would recommend we focus on Wakanda for now.” Okoye said. “We lost a great deal of our soldiers in the fight before the snap, and even more afterwards. If we spread ourselves too thin we make ourselves vulnerable to attack.”

“Wakanda is strong.” Shuri argued “We can survive an attack while also helping those around us.”

“Perhaps before.” Okoye replied “But at the request of the Avengers far too many of our fighters were killed. The combination of the fight against Thanos and the use of the Infinity Stones has left us with only a third of our warriors left alive - and that is including the Jabari.”

“And now that the outside world knows about our technology, how long do you think it will be until certain countries try to confiscate it for their own military?” M’Kathu asked

Shuri frowned, biting her lip. It was a good point. Normally it would be a simple task to offer aid to their neighbouring countries and defend themselves from attack, but with the majority of their fighters dead and the losses sustained to every other part of their society suffering loses thanks to the Infinity Stones, to spread themselves more thin could put their society at risk of collapse. 

“But in the past we promised to use our resources to offer aid to the outside world.” Shuri reminded them “Don't you think we should expect that they will ask for it now?”

“We will just have to tell them that Wakanda is no longer in a position to offer help.” M’Kathu said firmly

“But wouldn't a confession of weakness make use more open to attack?” Shuri asked

“If we keep our people close we should be able to defend against an attack, but that won’t be possible if we spread ourselves thin.”

“All right.” Shuri relented. It didn’t sit right with her though, to leave the rest of the world to fall into chaos. “We will say for the time being that we can not offer help. I would like to offer to take in refugees from nearby countries should recent events lead to a collapse in their society, are there any objections?”

There weren’t.

“Alright then.” Shuri said “We will focus our efforts on repairing the damage done to Wakanda, offer emergency medical training to our civilians for the time being, and open our borders to refugees should the snap cause nearby countries to collapse. Is that all?”

“What do you plan to do about the Avengers?” Okoye inquired

“What do you mean?” Shuri asked

“There are rumors that they plan to try and reverse Thanos’ snap.” Okoye clarified.

“Oh,” Shuri blinked. “I… had not heard that.”

“Well,” The mining tribe elder started “now that you have, what do you plan to do about it.”

Shuri sighed, thinking over her response. To try and reverse the actions of the Infinity Stones… Shuri couldn’t rule it out as a possibility, but the problem was that no one knew where the Infinity Stones were anymore. They weren’t on earth, or even in their solar system, that’s all anyone could say definitively. In order to reverse the snap they would first need to locate the Infinity Stones, and then find a way to travel outside their solar system - not to mention the amount of troubles that would come with actually acquiring and using the Infinity Stones. 

They had no way to travel the galaxy, much less other galaxies. While Wakanda was the most technologically advanced society on earth, they had not developed space travel beyond what other countries had - it had been a topic of debate during her father’s reign, but they had ultimately concluded that it would put them to close to the public eye to safely pursue. 

However, if it became a real possibility instead of just a theoretical one that would make it their best course of action. While Shuri knew humanity could try to bounce back from the recent tragedy, the facts were that the half of humanity that had been ‘dusted’ - as the media had begun to refer to the losses- they weren’t the only ones who had died. Several people had been killed in resulting accidents when drivers, pilots, and people conducting heavy machinery had suddenly vanished. The current estimate was that three fifths of humanity had been killed or severely injured by the the Snap. While Wakanda’s current lack of political turmoil and superior technology and resources left them at the highest chance of pulling through, Shuri wasn’t so sure that the rest of the world could survive the results of the Snap. So to be able to reverse the effect? 

She wanted to help them, she really did, but it wasn’t something she could responsibly invest her countries resources in during a crisis.

“Wakanda is in a state of crisis.” Shuri stated “I can’t use the countries time and resources to help the Avengers with what is only a hypothetical possibility. However, on my personal time I would like to individually discuss the possibility with the Avengers, so that we may know if it becomes a real possibility. In that case, I would re-discuss the matter with the council. Does that sound okay?”

Okoye nodded. 

“That sounds reasonable.” M’Kathu said.

The rest of the council made various expressions of agreement. Shuri nodded to them in thanks, and adjourned the meeting.

“You did well.” Okoye whispered to her in the hallway, giving her arm a reassuring squeeze. 

“Thanks.” Shuri muttered in reply.

Frantic shouts from outside drew her attention. Shuri peered through the nearest window to see another alien ship hurtling towards the ground on the now cleared battlefield.

She grabbed her gauntlets, racing outside. Faintly she heard Okoye shout to the Dora Milaje behind her.

She came to a stop a few feet from where she estimated the ship would land, deciding it wouldn’t be safe to wander any closer, and held her gauntlets out in preparation for a fight. The Dora Milaje and Nakia standing just behind her, and the Avengers rushing to catch up.

The ship landed sloppily, hitting the ground hard and grinding to a stop through the dirt. 

Shuri waited with bated breath for whatever was on the ship to reveal itself. 

Finally it did. The ship door fell to the ground with a clang. Shuri could only make out two figures through the smoke. The first came forward confidently, a blue cyborg woman holding two electric batons.

The second figure was presumed-dead Avenger Tony Stark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took both more and less time than I thought it would. Any comments/feedback appreciated!!!!


	5. Amends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick Preface: this fic is a slight au of canon. Here are the notable changes  
> \- Pepper and Tony aren't a couple. If the MCU can't stay consistent about this I'm just gonna ignore it.  
> \- Wanda is a Jewish Romani woman same as in the comics. She also didn't knowingly volunteer for HYDRA because like... That's Real Bad. Her powers are still from the mind stone though, since I mutants don't exist in the MCU
> 
> Enjoy!

Steve stared in shock. They’d all assumed Tony was dead, by all accounts he should be. Last he’d heard the man had hopped onto one of Thanos’ lackeys’ spaceships and left to fight on some far off solar system. After a day, he’d sort of assumed Tony had either been killed or dusted.

He supposed he should have known better. After all, this wasn’t the first time Tony had gone to space during a fight and come back alive. Though the last time, and they’d all assumed it would be the last time, had been significantly shorter.

“Tony, oh my god.” He heard Rhodey exclaim from behind him, rushing past Steve to pull his apparently-alive old friend into a hug. “What the hell happened to you?”

It was a fair question, Tony looked like shit. He all but collapsed into Rhodey’s arms, and clung to his friend. His armor was gone and he seemed to have a gaping but filled in hole in his side, surrounded by what appeared to be four small cubes taped under his shirt. 

“Got stabbed.” Steve heard Tony mutter into Rhodey’s shoulder, fingers grasping his shirt.

“Jesus.” Rhodey muttered.  
“Relax,” The cyborg who had arrived with him said, rolling her eyes. Her voice was breathy, and sounded like metal scraping against metal. She sounded almost annoyed. “he isn’t dying.” 

“Who are you?” Steve asked her, giving her an evaluating look.

“Who are you?” She countered, squaring her shoulders and subtly moving her feet into a grounded position.

“Relax, he’s a friend.” Tony told her, pulling out of Rhodey’s embrace to face the other Avengers.

She relaxed her posture, but continued to eye Steve distrustfully. 

A friend. Well, That was interesting. Especially considering that the last time they’d seen each other they’d nearly killed each other in the snow.

Steve had had lots of time to regret that, combined with a full day to feel guilty about it under the assumption Tony had died.

Bastard couldn’t let him hold a grudge in peace without making them all think he was dead.

“I’m Steve.” He told her. “Steve Rogers.”

“That’s a stupid name.” She informed him bluntly. “I’m Nebula.”

“That’s the guardians ship.” Rocket, the raccoon, said from behind Steve - pushing his way in front of him. “Where are they?”

Nebula’s gaze dropped to meet the raccoon. Something harsh flashed in her eyes as she took in a whirring metallic breath.

“Dead.” She said simply, voice sharp with anger.

Rocket’s face fell in dismay, he stared at Nebula with an open expression of despair. Steve saw Thor rest a comforting and on the raccoons shoulder.

He left an appropriate amount of silence before speaking up.

“Is there anywhere we can uh,” He addressed Shuri and nodded towards Tony “get him some medical attention?”

“Bring him with me.” Shuri said, turning towards the direction of her lab. “Our hospitals are understaffed at the moment.”

Okoye, who had up until now been so quiet Steve had forgotten about the presence of her and others outside of the former Avengers, called for the Dora Milaje to be at peace. The small impromptu gathering quietly disbanded. They seemed surprisingly undisturbed by the new chain of events. 

Steve and the rest of the Avengers awkwardly followed Wakanda’s new Queen, Tony walking with the support of Rhodey and Okoye following just behind - keeping an eye on their new alien arrival. Steve really had no idea why Nebula was coming with them, but if Tony claimed she was a friend Steve supposed he could trust her for now.

No one spoke. 

Once they’d entered the lab, Shuri brought Tony into the main lab area - leaving the rest of the group in the hall.

Steve waited until they’d disappeared before turning to the rest of the group. Rhodey was next to Steve, leaning against a pillar jutting out from the wall. Natasha stood on his right with Bruce on her other side. Across from them stood Thor, occasionally giving an anxious but sympathetic look to Rocket who stood to his right. Okoye stood across from Steve, in front of the entrance to the lab. She kept an eye on the group, but didn’t seem to concerned about anyone aside from their newest arrival.

Nebula stood two feet away from them, leaning against a pillar similarly to Rhodey. Her arms were crossed tight across her body as she gazed hollowly at the ground. Her brow was knit and Steve could have sworn she was chewing on her lip.

“So,” Bruce said “Tony’s alive.”

Rhodey let out a short laugh, covering his face with his hands and sliding onto the ground.

“Seems like it.” Steve muttered. He wasn’t sure what to make of it, but he definitely didn’t want to deal with it right now.

“Guess he can tell us what happened with Thanos before he got here.” Natasha noted, crossing her arms.

Steve raised an eyebrow at her.

“Well he left to stop Thanos from getting the time stone, and Thanos definitely had the time stone when he got here.” She explained

“You guys kind suck, huh?” Rocket piped up from beside Thor’s leg.

Steve blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Just saying,” Rocket shrugged. “I mean, you guys were disbanded before this happened right? And none of you did what you meant to here. Have you ever done anything successfully?”

Once. Possibly twice, if you counted beating a problem caused by one of the members.

“I’m sorry, but it doesn’t look like your team stopped Thanos either.” Natasha pointed out.

“My team is dead.” Rocket snapped “Because you idiots didn’t destroy the mind stone when you had the chance.”

“It’s not that simple.” Bruce argued. “We couldn’t have destroyed it without potentially killing one of our team mates.”

“So you put the entire universe in jeopardy?” Nebula stated as a question, lifting her eyes from the ground to give Steve a challenging look. 

“We don’t trade lives.” Steve repeated from the day before, the words felt hollow now.

“Don’t you?” Okoye asked. “Because it seems to me that you do.”  
“Hey-” Natasha opened her mouth angrily as if to argue, but Okoye cut her off.

“You weren’t willing to destroy the mind stone when it was a part of Vision, even though he asked you too, so you brought him here to Wakanda.” Okoye elaborated “ You brought _Thanos_ to Wakanda, and then you asked us to fight his army to protect your friend. We lost several of our people before the snap, and you are still here asking for favors.”

Steve stared at her. “We couldn’t just kill Vision.”

“You could.” Okoye said “And in the end, you did. Besides, he asked you to kill him, he knew what was at stake. You placed the life of one robot asking to be sacrificed over the lives of several of my people, and half the galaxy. Even if you manage to reverse the snap, the lives lost trying to keep Thanos at bay for your failed plan will never be regained.”

Steve opened his mouth, before closing it again. What could he say to that?

“We can’t change what has already happened.” Thor said sincerely after a long beat of silence. “I am sorry to hear that you have lost so much, but all we can do now is try to move on.”

“Actually,” Steve said awkwardly. “Like Okoye mentioned, we are trying to reverse the snap.”

Nebula cackled, tossing her head back and letting out a harsh metallic laugh. “Good luck with that.”

“Hold on,” Rocket told her. “If they have a way to bring back my friends I wanna hear it. Don’t you want to bring Gamora back?”

Nebula’s jaw tightened, her fingers seemed to dig into her arms. She looked away once again, staring angrily at the wall as if it was responsible for her sorrows.

“Gamora died before the snap.”

“What?” Rocket asked.

“Thanos killed her when they went to Vormir.” Nebula informed him.

Rocket fell silent. Nebula lifted her gaze to the ceiling, blinking fast.

“Who’s Gamora?” Bruce interrupted the silence.

“My sister.” Nebula nearly growled, looking up through a furrowed brow and taking a deep breath through her nose.

Steve couldn’t think of anything to say to that. He’d never had a sibling. Must be tough to lose one though. 

Steve prayed for a quick distraction. He really was out of his depth in this conversation. 

His prayers were answered by the sound of two voices growing closer.

“How did you do that?” He heard Tony’s voice coming from Shuri’s lab. “That’s- I mean theoretically that shouldn’t be possible.”

“Just because you haven’t figured out how to do it,” Shuri sounded amused as she opened the door to the lab, bringing the two into the hallway with the rest of the group. “Doesn’t mean it isn’t possible.”

Tony tilted his head in an odd sideways almost-nod that seemed to imply his agreement. He locked eyes with Steve before sweeping his gaze over the rest of the group. There was a beat of silence.

“Have you seen the tech they have here?” Tony asked, barreling through the discomfort and pointing a thumb back to the lab. “Crazy stuff! Reminds me a little of the stuff this guy keeps bringing to earth.”

He pointed to Thor with the last statement. Steve silently thanked him for offering a quick out from the previous conversation. 

“We haven’t been in Wakanda that long.” Steve admitted

“Well hopefully you can stay a little longer.” Shuri addressed the group, Okoye made a noise of disagreement. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you, come with me.”

Steve exchanged a look with Nat - raising his eyebrows to ask what she thought it could be about. She shrugged, and fell into step next to Steve as they followed Wakanda’s new Queen.

Steve felt a vague sense of anxiety growing in his stomach. He was aware that Shuri’s brother had been one of the people to die in the snap, and as Okoye had mentioned a lot of Wakanda’s people had been killed even before then. She was probably very upset with them. 

He hoped that wasn’t what this was about.

She led them to a somewhat secluded room with just enough chairs for everyone. Steve took a seat close to where she sat - with Okoye on her other side. He noted that Nebula chose to stay standing, leaning with her arms crossed close to the door. 

Natasha took a seat next to Steve, Thor sat across the room from her. Bruce and Rocket took the seats next to Thor, and Tony quickly took the seat on Bruce’s open side - patting the chair next to him for Rhodey to take. 

“So,” Shuri started. “I heard that you’ve been talking about reversing the snap.”

“Yes, they were just talking about that.” Thor said cheerfully.

“Oh, alright then!” Shuri returned his smile. “So what’s your plan so far?”

Silence again. Everyone seemed to be staring at Steve expectantly, his mind raced as he tried to think of a way to break the news.

“We,” he said carefully, awkwardly “we don’t have one.”

Shuri blinked at him, gaze uncomprehending.

“The idea was,” Natasha defended from next to him “that we would try to use the infinity stones to reverse the damage. But we have no way to find them, or to leave the planet successfully, so…”

A harsh metallic cackle from behind them drew everyone's gaze back to Nebula standing by the door. Steve watched as for the second time that day her face split into a humorless grin. 

“Well this has been a waste of time.” She said, pushing herself off the wall and grabbing the edge of the doorway to swing herself through.

“Where are you going?” Tony asked her

“I've got a father to kill.” She stated casually, like it wasn't the weirdest phrase she could throw them as a goodbye.

Steve blinked, trying to understand how that could take such a huge priority at a moment like this. Especially knowing that her sister had just died. He looked to the rest of the group to see much of the same statement echoed in their faces - except for Thor, who was grimacing sympathetically. 

“This again?” Rocket stood.

“Yes this again.” She spat, spinning on her heels and stalking towards him. “The Infinity Stones take an enormous toll on anyone who uses them and the black order is dead. Thanos is at his most defenseless now, I'm done wasting time.”

“Thanos is your father?!” Steve exclaimed. He couldn't imagine Thanos having children - it went against his entire image of the monster. 

Though, if his daughter was out to kill him Steve had to guess that Thanos was a pretty shitty dad.

“Yeah, and?” Nebula snapped, before turning back to Rocket - no longer acknowledging anyone else in the room. Her expression softened somewhat. “I'm taking the Milano. You can come with me, Thanos deserves to pay for what he's done to the both of us.”

“No, you'll get us both killed!” Rocket exclaimed, before repeating himself more seriously. “You do realize you're going to get yourself killed right?”

“As long as bring him down with me.” Nebula accepted gravely.

“No.” Rocket shook his head. “No, I'm not coming on your suicide mission. And you're not taking my ship.”

“That's too bad, ” Nebula said insincerely, turning to leave again.“because you can't stop me.”

“That ship is all I have left of my friends!” Rocket shouted reaching up and grabbing Nebula's wrist harshly as if to stop her.

“Its all I have left of my sister!” She cried, whirling around and yanking her arm out of his grip.

Steve gripped the edge of his chair, ready to jump up at the sign of a fight. He felt Natasha tense up next to him.

They waited, breathing anxiously in the tense silence. Nebula and Rocket remained still in the middle of the room, not speaking but still glaring at each other.

“Thanos killed my brother.” Shuri said suddenly, softly.

Nebula’s wet eyes snapped away from Rocket, gaze softening to something indecipherable as she looked to Shuri.

“He killed my brother.” Shuri repeated firmly, voice shaking. Meeting Nebula’s eyes, she rose from her seat. “I want him to pay for what he's done, but it's more important right now that we make sure the universe can survive this catastrophe. Revenge won't do that.”

“The universe won't survive.” Nebula recited, almost as if she was reading from a script. “Every single planet Thanos has ‘saved’ descended into chaos immediately after. No civilization has survived meeting him. Revenge is all we have left.”

“If we can reverse the snap we can still save the ones he's only just doomed.” Shuri insisted, stepping towards her. “You said you were going to go after him, that means you know where he is. If we can find him, we can get the infinity stones. That means there's hope.”

Nebula seemed surprised by her conviction, taking a step back and straightening her posture. She opened her mouth, before closing it again.  
“There, there was a planet- a farm. He mentioned retiring.” Nebula stumbled over her words before shaking her head. “But it's no use, the infinity stones combined are too dangerous - they can't be used alone by most people.”

“But that's why Thanos made the gauntlet right?” Tony asked. “I mean, that's supposed to make them safe to use.” 

“It was destroyed.” Thor said. “Killing half the universe destroyed it.”

“But if we find the infinity stones we can still try.” Steve suggested

“They would tear your tiny terran bodies apart and destroy your minds.” Rocket said. “I mean, the space and time stones you could maybe use but I've seen first hand what the power stone does.”

“It would rip you apart in less than a second.” Nebula agreed. “And you’d still need to use the other five.”

Steve didn't know what to say to that. It had been a desperate plan, but it was also their last hope. Without it, they were doomed to die like countless other civilizations Thanos had destroyed in his misinformed quest to save the universe.

“The time stone.” Shuri whispered, head snapping up. “What if we used the time stone? We could go back before Thanos got his hands on the infinity stones, we could destroy them before he gets a chance to use them!”

“I….” Nebula frowned, as if she was having trouble finding a problem with that plan. “I mean… it's possible, but the further back you go the less likely it is to work.”

“Time travel is unstable,” Thor agreed “But not impossible.”

“Wouldn't that create a time paradox?” Tony asked

Nebula made an uncertain gesture with her hand. “There’s a reason the infinity stones are so powerful. The time stone exists out of time the way we experience it. It's been used to go backwards before.”

“To use it to go backwards would replace it's past self with an older version of itself,” Thor explained “which wouldn't matter since it doesn't exist in time.” 

“So a paradox would only be a problem with people then,” Shuri reasoned “since we experience time linearly and it would be replacing a past version of ourselves with our present consciousness.”

Nebula nodded. “But since we would be using the time stone, it basically prevents a paradox within reason. The further back you go, the greater the risk - but if you only go back a few days pretty much anything goes.”

“Are you absolutely sure?” Shuri asked.

“Thanos had us learn everything we could about the infinity stones.” Nebula told her. “Aside from those who can use them, I'm the closest thing there is to an expert.”

“Well then it's a good thing you're here!” Thor said cheerfully. “Especially since you can lead us to it!”

“Wait but even if Thanos is where she thinks he is, how are we gonna get there?” Bruce asked. “I mean, we'd need a ship and the Statesman is….”

The Statesman? Had Bruce been off of earth this whole time?

“We can take the Milano.” Rocket offered. “If you make an actual plan, we can take the Milano.”

“Does it have stealth technology?” Shuri asked.

“Stealth technology?” Rocket looked intrigued. “No it doesn't. Can it?”

“Yes!” Shuri said enthusiastically. “I mean, we've never tried it in space before but it should work! Besides, you're going to need it for this mission - you're going to want to have the element of surprise for as long as possible.”

Rocket looked delighted. 

“Queen Shuri,” Okoye's voice rang with a tone reminiscent of an chastising older sister. “I should remind you that you promised the council that you would not invest Wakanda's resources in the Avengers plan.”

“I said I wouldn't unless,” Shuri reminded Okoye “Their plan seemed possible, in which case I would ask the council.”

Okoye raised an eyebrow, stone-faced.

“Plus it'll be a great opportunity to see how our tech works in space!” Shuri continued excitedly.

“Alright,” Okoye sighed in defeat, face breaking into a fond smile. “When you go to the council you will have my support.”

Shuri beamed.

“Alright!” She clasped her hands together and spun to face the rest of the group. “Well, I should start preparing for that meeting. You are welcome to stay and rest in Wakanda until we finish this mission. Tomorrow we'll talk strategy.”

“Thank you.” Steve said, bowing his head slightly as the group slowly filed out of the door.

“Best of luck with your meeting.” Thor said brightly “They can get boring.”

Shuri grinned.

Once they were in the hallway, and Shuri had left with Okoye to organize her council meeting, Steve heard Tony shout out.

“Hey Nebula!” Tony held out the cubes Steve had noticed earlier when Tony had first arrived. “These are yours.”

“Oh.” Was all Nebula said, holding out her hands to accept them.

“Where are you headed?”

“Back to the Milano.” She replied. 

Steve furrowed his brow. That didn’t sound like the best idea.

“Don't worry, I won't take off with it.” She assured them almost sarcastically.

“I'll be there to make sure she doesn't.” Rocket piped up

“How responsible of you.” Nebula commented dryly, not looking at him as she turned to leave - Rocket following close behind.

Steve wasn’t sure what to make of the pair. They definitely knew each other. They didn’t seem to be friends though, and Nebula wasn’t a part of Rocket’s now-deceased team.

Allies, maybe?

“Well,” Tony observed, watching them go. “They're … interesting.”

Steve hummed in agreement.

“We should get some rest.” Natasha announced. “Its been a long day.”

“It certainly has.” Rhodey agreed with a tired nod.

“Since we’re gonna be a Wakanda for a while, do you have anywhere to stay?” Steve asked Tony.

“Eh,” Tony shrugged evasively. “I'm sure Nebula won't mind if I stay on the Milano.”

“Uh… No, I think she definitely would.” Bruce said.

Steve let out an amused breath. Bruce wasn't wrong, she didn't seem to be the best room mate material.

“You can stay with us.” He offered. “We have… less people than beds.” 

“Right.” Tony said quietly, seeming to deflate somewhat under the reminder of just how badly they'd all lost their last fight. After a beat of silence he quickly recovered. “Well alright then, the ship's a mess anyways.”

Steve acknowledged that with an awkward nod as they started to make their way to the nearby hotel the team had been staying at for the past two nights. He was painfully aware of Tony walking behind him to his right, and of the fact that no one was talking.

The silence had been a little more comfortable - wanted, even - back before it was caused by a dramatic falling out.

“So,” Thor started conversationally, either blissfully unaware of the tension in the group or determined to steamroll over it. “What were you doing in space anyways, Stark?”

“Uh,” Tony sounded unsure. “fighting Thanos? One of his … minions was trying to bring the time stone to him.”

“Yes, yes.” Thor waved off what Tony had said as if it was all what he'd already known, although Steve was sure there was some new information in there. “But why were you alone?”

“I wasn't, everyone else just got dusted. Aside from Nebula, that is.”

“But why did none of the team go with you?” Thor pressed. “Everyone was already in Wakanda when I arrived. Unless… did Clint go with you?”

“Clint’s alive.” Natasha chimed in. “He's on house arrest. I called yesterday, the Bartons are fine.”

“House arrest?” Thor sounded amused. “What for?”

Oh. Oh, fuck.

They forgot to tell Thor.

“We’re kind of…” Steve tried to think of the vaguest terms he could use. “on the run from SHIELD, and the rest of the government.”

“Ah,” Thor said. “Well I suppose that was bound to happen. SHIELD never did seem too friendly.”

A massive understatement.

“But,” Thor seemed determined to return to his point. “if Barton wasn't with you that means no one from the team was, so again why?”

“Well, Hulk is currently M.I.A so Bruce couldn't come.” Tony explained evasively. 

“Oh is he?” Thor turned to look at Bruce, who nodded in confirmation. 

Thor scoffed. “Hulk is childish.”

“You're telling me.” Bruce muttered.

“But Romanoff could've still gone, or Rogers.” Thor's questioning was rapidly becoming painful, and Steve prayed for someone to quickly put an end to it.

Unfortunately, Tony didn't seem to be in a rush to reply. 

“For god's sake just tell him.” Rhodey sounded exasperated. “You're all too old to act this childish.”

“The Avengers… split up.” Steve admitted for them.

Thor blinked. “Pardon?”

“There is no team.” Tony said simply “We don't work together anymore.”

Work together. 

He said it like they were simply co-workers who had moved jobs, instead of friends with at least three years of history. Like they hadn’t saved each other’s lives more times than they could count, like they hadn’t gotten so used to the presence of the rest of their team in their lives that it felt like something was missing the whole time they were disbanded.

“You… don't work together anymore.” Thor repeated. There was an air of judgement there that made Steve's stomach twist.

“No.” Steve said quietly. He was suddenly vividly aware of the fact that they'd never made Thor angry before, at least not since getting to know each other.

“But your job is to protect Midgard.” Thor’s voice betrayed no anger, but the tone was strained.

“We still do.” Steve defended. “We just do it separately.”

“But why?” Thor asked. “The reason we had the Avengers is because we worked better as a team.”

“There was…” Steve could hear Tony struggling to think of how to explain it. “There was an accident. We had a mission in another country, and a lot of innocent people were killed. By us.”

Thor sucked in a breath.

“It was unintentional.” Steve explained. “Collateral damage, the fight was happening around them and…”

And he froze. And Wanda tried to save him. And several civilians died so he could live.

“and we couldn't save them.” Natasha finished.

“I see.” Thor said. “But that's no reason to-”

“It’s not all there's just a lot to explain.” Rhodey cut him off.

“We didn't have permission to be in the country we were in.” Tony continued. “The government didn't know we were there, didn't know there was a threat, and didn't know we were pursuing it. Then we got a ton of innocent people killed.”

“More would have died if we hadn't been there.” Steve reasoned.

“The world governments decided we shouldn't be allowed to operate unsupervised and without consequence.” Tony ignored him. “They wrote up a big agreement called the Sokovia Accords.”

Thor nodded, brow knit as if trying to figure out where this was going.

“The Accords wouldn't have let us operate freely, we would need permission from the UN for every mission.” Steve explained

“Or at least every mission outside the US.” Tony added

“I thought it would be a bad idea to sign, since it would force us to work for other people's agendas and we wouldn't be able to respond to a crisis like this one when we needed to.” 

“And I thought that the Accords were going to be forced on us anyways so it was better to join in the beginning so we could negotiate the terms to better fit what we needed, instead of have the Accords legally forced on us which would leave us unable to change them.” Tony said pointedly.

“And… they had a point.” Tony continued cautiously. “If other governments knew when we were operating within their borders they'd be able to get local law enforcement to clear the areas, a lot less civilians would die.”

Steve opened his mouth to object, before being cut off.

“So you disagreed.” Thor said “That still doesn’t explain why-”

“The meeting to sign the accords was attacked, people died - including Wakanda’s former king.” Natasha cut in. “Steve’s friend was the main suspect and we were supposed to help bring him in.”

“Ah.” Thor nodded as if that explained everything.

“He didn’t do it.” Steve rushed to explain “But when I went to get him everything was already too complicated. Sam and I-”

His voice caught in his throat. He choked, blinking back a sudden pain behind his eyes.

Sam. 

Fuck.

Sam was gone now.

Steve took a deep breath, pushing his grief aside.

“We got arrested for getting involved.” He continued, as if that moment hadn’t happened. “We escaped, and after that we thought there was a threat we had to deal with-”

“By then those of us who signed the accords were sent to bring them in.” Natasha continued

“There was a huge fight.” Steve finished lamely, but it was better than getting into the details. “And the Avengers have been broken up since.”

Thor’s brow furrowed. It seemed that their explanation had only further confused him.

“Why didn’t you just discuss this?” Thor asked like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Maybe it was to a thousand year old god. It wasn’t often Steve was reminded that Thor was so much older than him.

“Yeah, I don’t really get it either.” Bruce half whispered, leaning towards Thor. 

“To be fair Rogers did leave me a phone if I needed to contact him.” Tony said tiredly

“Which is more than you do, hey?” Rhodey said jokingly, playfully elbowing Thor.

Steve appreciated the attempt to lighten the atmosphere, especially since the length of the conversation had brought them to their hotel.

“I suppose it is.” Steve could hear Thor fight to keep the disappointment out of his voice.

Honestly, that hurt more than any injury he’d gotten during the fight. It took a lot to make Thor upset, especially with them.

With that knife in his gut, Steve opened the door to the hotel. He held it for the rest of the group and filed in behind them. Aside from some mumbled ‘Thank you’s they cleared the lobby and climbed the stairs to their hotel room in silence.

Natasha unlocked the door and tossed her jacket on the couch.

“I’m boiling the kettle do you want anything?” She called, not looking back as she walked towards the open kitchen.

“I’ll have some tea.” Bruce followed her through the arch separating the living room from the kitchen.

“I’m good.” Steve replied, sinking into the couch. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Taking the brief moment for a break from the tension in the group.

“I called Pepper to let her know you’re alive.” He heard Rhodey say. “She says hi.”

He heard Tony let out a relieved breath. 

“Is Happy alive too?” Tony asked

“Yeah, they’re doing good.” Rhodey said “Well, as good as they can given…”

“Yeah….” Tony sounded grim “That reminds me, I’ve got a phone call to make.”

The sound of rustling fabric, a small breath. Steve assumed they were hugging.

“I’m glad you’re alive.” Tony’s voice sounded muffled, Steve’s assumption had been correct.

“Yeah, just don’t make me think you’re dead again.” Rhodey replied “Three times is enough.”

He heard Tony let out a weak chuckle before the sound of a closing door.

Footsteps, the cushion next to him sank with the weight of a second person. Steve opened his eyes and lifted his head to see Rhodey sitting next to him.

“Weird day, huh?” Rhodey asked conversationally.

Steve shrugged. “I think we’ve both had weirder.”

“You’re not wrong.” Rhodey gave an unenthusiastic laugh.

“I didn’t thank you, by the way.” Steve mentioned

“Hm?”

“For being so quick to help us.” Steve clarified “Even though…”

He trailed off, leaving the sentence hanging in the air. It wasn’t like Rhodey didn’t know what he was talking about.

“You know,” Rhodey said, once it became obvious that Steve just wasn’t going to finish that sentence. “Your fight wasn’t as world-ending to the rest of us as you and Tony seem to think it is. I fought you in that airport because I trusted that we were the best people to do it, not because of some personal vendetta.”

Steve blinked, a fair point he supposed. He was ashamed to admit that it wasn’t one that had crossed his mind, perhaps he had been a little to caught up in his own version of events.

“But you were hurt.” Steve pointed out. ‘Hurt’ seemed like a pathetic way to describe it.

“I got better.” Rhodey said. “It still sucks, but if you want to get technical Vision was the one who did that- and he was on our ‘side’.”

Well, that was true. Though it wouldn’t have happened if they had just not fought.

“Well, thanks anyways.” Steve said awkwardly. “If you ever need anything…”

“I’ll ask someone who isn’t on the run.” Rhodey joked. “Besides, I’m not heartless, Steve. Did you think I was just going to let the world die because you had a fight with my best friend?” 

“No, I guess not.” Steve laughed. “No, that would be ridiculous. You’re right.”

“I usually am.” Rhodey sighed dramatically. “But no one ever listens.”

“You know, Tony has told me some college stories that dispute that.” Steve teased.

“Pff,” Rhodey scoffed, waving a hand dismissively. “That was college, it doesn’t count.”

“Sure.” Steve agreed. 

The sound of dishes clattering in the sink made them both turn their heads to the kitchen. Natasha was putting the tea bags away while Bruce quickly put the mug she’d thrown in the sink into the dishwasher instead. 

“I’m headed to bed.” She announced, leaving the kitchen and heading down the small hallway of bedrooms. “You guys should get some rest too.”

“That doesn’t sound to bad.” Bruce muttered, taking off his glasses and rubbing his hand over his face. “It’s been a long week.”

Steve and Rhodey watched them both disappear down the hallway, falling into a comfortable silence. 

“They’ve got the right idea, I think.” Rhodey stood up slowly, stretching his arms. “You gonna get some sleep too?”

“Maybe later.” Steve said, waving for Rhodey to go on without him. 

He wasn’t sure he was going to be able to sleep, his chest was tied in knots.

“Alright.” Rhodey shrugged. “Well, Goodnight.”

“‘Night.” Steve muttered absently, leaning his head back and closing his eyes once more to the sound of footsteps going down the hall.

Forget not being able to sleep. He had no idea how long it had taken him to drift off, but he was woken by the sound of someone dropping a glass in the kitchen.

He leapt from the couch, reaching for a weapon until his eyes fell on Tony.

“Shit.” Tony cursed, bending down to clean up the glass.

Steve watched him, he didn’t seem to have noticed that Steve was there yet.

Quietly Steve entered the kitchen, reaching between the fridge and the wall to retrieve the broom. He separated the dust pan from the broom handle and handed it to Tony.

“Thanks.” Tony said simply, holding the pan with shaking hands on the floor while Steve silently swept the broken glass. “Sorry about that, butter fingers.”

“It happens.” Steve mumbled, stopping his sweeping once he was satisfied there were no more shards waiting on the floor. “What time is it?”

“Uh,” Tony lifted the dustpan and started rifling through the cupboards for something to put them in. “A little past 11, I think.”

“Shit, must have fallen asleep.” Steve muttered, dragging his hand down his face. “There’s a box for broken glass under the sink.”

“Oh,” Tony opened the cupboard and pulled out the box, dumping the shards in. “How convenient.”

“Yeah well,” Steve shrugged, putting the broom back. “Thor still hasn’t gotten used to how breakable our ‘Midgardian cups’ are I guess.”

Tony chuckled. “That guy.”

“Yeah,” Steve nodded. “He has a point though.”

“Oh?” Tony feigned ignorance and put the dustpan next to the broom, not looking at Steve. “What about?”

“We could’ve talked.” Steve admitted. “We probably should have.”

Tony was quiet, he pulled himself into a standing position and crossed his arms across his chest. He squinted at Steve through the dim light, looking him up and down as if evaluating something.

Tony let out a sigh, shoulders deflating somewhat. 

“I mean,” Tony met his gaze. “I did try.”

Steve nodded. “I guess you did.”

“Didn’t call though, did I?” Tony admitted.

“No, you didn’t” 

“Can’t do anything about it now.” Tony looked away.

Steve knew this conversation wasn’t going to go anywhere. Tony didn’t seem to want to talk, and Steve certainly didn’t either. 

Still, it didn’t feel like they were finished and Steve couldn’t leave until it did.

Not that Tony was making any move to leave either. 

“Be honest with me.” Tony said, still not looking at Steve. “Who’s… who… you know?”

Steve blinked at the sudden subject change. He supposed Tony wouldn’t know who had died, he hadn’t been there after all. But still, it should have been obvious from the missing members of their group.

Maybe he just wanted to be wrong.

“Wanda and Vision first,” Steve said. “Then Sam.”

Just saying it brought a pang to his chest.

Tony sucked in a breath. “You’re sure?”

Steve nodded. 

“Fuck.” Tony dragged his hands down his face. “They shouldn’t…”

“Yeah,” Steve agreed. “But they did.”

Tony crossed his arms again, looking to Steve’s right before looking back at him. 

“Is that…” He pursed his lips, clearly trying to think of how to phrase his next sentence. “From the people we know, was there anyone else?”

Steve took a breath, meeting Tony’s eyes. He hadn’t wanted to bring it up, he wasn’t sure how Tony would react and he really didn’t have the energy to deal with a bad response.

“Bucky.” Steve admitted, feeling like he’d dropped a bag of bricks on his chest. “Bucky died too.”

Tony’s face fell, mouth opening in an expression of surprise.

“I’m sorry.” Tony sounded sincere. “I know Bucky was your friend.”

Steve let out a breath, not necessarily relieved but… less tense.

“Yeah well,” Steve shrugged. “If this plan works, they’ll be back.”

Tony nodded. They fell into uncomfortable silence for what felt like the hundredth time.

“How’d your phone call go?” Steve asked, trying for a quick subject change.

Tony raised his eyebrows.

“Heard you talking to Rhodey.” Steve gestured with his head towards the hallway.

“Ah,” Tony said. “About as well as you’d expect. I was telling the kid’s Aunt that he died.”

Well that had backfired spectacularly.

“The kid from the airport?” Steve asked.

Tony nodded, blinking fast suddenly very interested in staring at the fridge. “His Aunt’s his only living family. She was… distraught.”

“Tony…” Steve said uncertainley. “Even if you hadn’t brought him with you, wherever it was you went, he still would have… I mean, the snap was random he wouldn’t have survived just because you left him on earth.”

“Maybe.” Tony clenched his jaw. “But he wouldn’t have died at all if I hadn’t let Thanos get the time stone.”

“You did what you could.” Steve defended. “We didn’t stop Thanos from getting the mind stone either.”

“Strange gave him the time stone to save me.” Tony admitted angrily, meeting Steve’s eyes. “If I hadn’t brought the fight to Thanos, he might not have won.”

Steve didn’t know what to say to that. 

“Well,” He started. “We should just focus on fixing it now, while we have a chance.”

“Guess you’re right.” Tony nodded tiredly.

Steve gave him a weak smile. Oddly enough, this was the most familiar situation Steve had found himself in all day. It wasn’t uncommon for him to find someone in their group blaming themselves for a death, recent or not. 

The one thing they all had in common was survivors guilt.

“I’m sorry.” Tony said suddenly.

Steve raised an eyebrow.

“For the fight in Siberia.” Tony continued. “I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did. My parents have been dead for years, I don’t even like my dad, but…”

Tony closed his eyes and took a breath. Steve waited for him to find his words. Tony opened his eyes with a snap, looking up at the ceiling and letting out a breath.

“It was different to see it.” Tony said slowly. “I know it wasn’t Bucky’s fault, we don’t blame Clint for what he did when he was being controlled by Loki so we shouldn’t blame Bucky either. He was a victim too. It’s just… knowing your mother is dead is one thing but... watching someone strangle her, knowing the person who did it is standing next to you….”

Tony dropped his gaze from the ceiling, looking back to Steve and giving a shrug.

“But I’m an adult, and it was shitty of me to react like that.” He finished. “I shouldn’t have attacked him, and I shouldn’t have said those things to you. I was wrong, I was angry and I lashed out at the both of you. I’m sorry for that.”

Steve nodded, to let Tony know he was accepting the apology. 

“You shouldn't have.” Steve agreed. “But Zemo was manipulating us both. He knew what buttons to push and he did.”

“Yeah, that guy was kind of creepy.” Tony laughed awkwardly, obviously trying to lighten the mood.

“I can’t imagine someone non-creepy joining HYDRA.” Steve joked.

“True.” Tony nodded.

Steve watched him, thinking. Thor had been right after all, this was as painful as pulling teeth but it was definitely better than beating the shit out of each other in an airport.

“I’m sorry too.” Steve admitted.

Tony blinked, raising his eyebrows at the sudden confession.

“Thor’s right, we could have talked instead of fighting.” Steve elaborated. “My gut reaction was that I wasn’t comfortable with the accords before I even read them, but they were inevitable so I think I was just looking for an excuse to fight so I wouldn’t have to sign them. Then everything with Bucky happened and…”

“Yeah.” Tony said. “Things got pretty crazy.”

“Yeah.” Steve agreed quietly.

Tony looked away, glaring at the fridge once again. Steve briefly wondered what it had ever done to Tony.

He quickly pushed that thought away when Tony snapped his gaze back to meet Steve’s eyes, a more controlled expression on his face.

“I wish you’d just told me in the airport what was going on.” Tony told him bluntly. “I would have helped. I tried to help as soon as I found out what happened, but I could have helped earlier if I’d known what was happening. We could have avoided that whole fight in the airport, Rhodey could have-”

Tony stopped himself, biting his teeth down and shaking his head.

“You’re right.” Steve conceded. “At that point I was… I was in such an ‘us or them’ mentality that I’d already convinced myself that you wouldn’t help.”

“You can’t do that.” Tony insisted. “If we’re gonna do this we need to be a team, and that means you’ve got to let us make decision based on _all_ the information.”

“So does that mean we're a team again?” Steve grinned. 

“Guess so.” Tony shrugged, grin creeping onto his face as well before quickly dropping to a more serious expression. “I mean, I’m not apologizing for signing the accords. Ross suck - he’s a real asshole- and those are definitely going to be used against us, but it seemed like the best option at the time. Plus I really do think we shouldn't be allowed to operate without supervision with the amount of power we have, I trust everyone here but that's bound to end terribly.”

“And I still don't agree.” Steve said firmly. “Which I won't apologize for either, but I'm sure we can work it out. Though, I think that should be a talk for another day.”

Tony nodded, turning to face the clock.

“Well fuck,” He started “technically it's already another day.”

Steve leaned past him to squint at the dimly illuminated letters. It certainly was another day, and 12:40 am. 

“I'm gonna try to sleep.” Tony announced making his way back down the hall to his own room. “How about you?”

“Yeah,” Steve agreed “Not a bad idea, plus a bed’s more comfortable than a couch.”

Tony chuckled at that, opening his door and disappearing into his room. 

Feeling lighter than he had earlier that day, Steve made a brief stop in the living room to hang up Natasha’s discarded jacket before making his way back to his own room. He forced himself to change into some actual pajamas before collapsing onto the bed and finally giving in to his urge to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two whole chapters in one month? Bless the winter break. 
> 
> Merry Christmas to those who celebrate! Kind of a coincidence that this Chapter went up on Christmas.
> 
> This chapter is also literally the longest one I've written so far, it's almost six times the length of the last ones. Oops!
> 
> Any feedback is greatly appreciated!!


	6. A Lot Of Running

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning for: (unrelated) brief mentions of injury, family death, torture, food allergies (specifcally peanut allergies), implied references to immigrants/immigration, and implied hospital death. Also contains a scene set in a hospital.
> 
> I changed my username :)

Steve woke up gasping in a cold sweat. Frantically he reminded himself that he was safe, he was in Wakanda, Thanos was gone.

His friends were dead and he had lost.

He groaned, dragging his hands over his face as if to wipe away the memory of watching Bucky disappear - of desperately searching for Sam and stumbling upon a pile of ashes where he had been.

Those damned rocks. Who the hell makes something that powerful anyways?

He blinked blearily at the clock. 6 am. So that was what… five and a half hours of sleep?

Well, it was almost acceptable. Steve dragged himself out of bed with a groan. He made his way over to the pile of clean clothes on the top of his chest of drawers and pulled out a tank top, some underwear, and jogging pants.

Pulling on the probably-clean clothes, Steve decided to go on a run after making his breakfast. It should take his mind of off… things.

Or leave him alone to dwell on it.

Steve sighed and made his way to the kitchen. Debating what he would make, he paused in the entrance way at the sight of Natasha sitting on the counter - one foot balanced on the edge of the sink as she drank from a mug of coffee.

“Of course you're up before everyone else.” Steve shook his head in amusement.

“Hey, you snooze you lose.” Natasha shrugged nonchalantly, before looking Steve up and down with concern. “Rough night?”

“You could say that.” Steve sighed, opening the fridge. 

“Nightmares or Tony?”

Steve snapped up, hitting his head on the fridge in his shock.

“Fuck!” He cursed, smacking his hand over his now stinging head.

Natasha snickered. 

“Why would you ask about Tony?” Steve asked, rubbing his head.

“Heard you two talking.” Natasha took a sip of her coffee. “Couldn't hear what about though.”

Oh, so she was curious. For a spy, she could be painfully unsubtle. 

“Nah, wasn't about Tony.” Steve kept it vague, watching Natasha's reaction with amusement. “Talk went fine.”

She glared at him over the rim of her mug, wise to his knowing her want for details and withholding them from her. She looked to the right, evaluating his words, before grinning.

“Oh, so you patched things up then?” She asked triumphantly. “Good, that was getting annoying.”

Steve sighed, nodding in defeat. He didn't know why he'd bothered, Natasha figured everything out eventually. 

“So, nightmare then.” Natasha tossed her mug into the sink.

“Yeah, well.” Steve admitted “Our friends did just die.”

She let out a breath, mouth pressed into a line.

“We'll get them back.” She said quietly. 

Steve nodded, less sure.

“What are you making?” She hopped from the counter, changing the subject.

“An Omelette, I think.” Steve decided, opening the fridge and pulling out a carton of eggs. 

He turned to see Natasha seated at the table, hands clasped into a platform for her chin, blinking at him innocently. 

He sighed. “Do you want one?”

“Yes please!” She grinned triumphantly. 

He chuckled, shaking his head as he searched through the cupboards for a frying pan. 

“Good morning!” Steve heard Thor cheerfully enter the kitchen area just as he pulled out a pan.

He wasn't so sure about the ‘Good’ part.

“‘Morning Thor.” Steve replied absently, scooping some butter into the pan. 

He didn't offer Thor an omelette, he wasn't sure he'd be able to cook enough for the man.

“So the council agreed to help us.” Natasha said conversationally, searching through the pantry.

Steve didn’t know why she was doing that if he was already cooking for her. He cracked some eggs into a bowl.

“That’s excellent news!” Thor declared cheerfully as Steve began beating the eggs.

“Guess so.” Natasha pulled a bagel out of the pantry, popping it in the toaster. “Shuri wants to set up a meeting later to discuss strategy.”

“What time?” Steve asked, pouring the eggs into the pan. 

“Dunno.” Natasha shrugged. “Afternoon I think? She wants to finish working on the Milano - Rocket and Nebula’s ship.”

Steve nodded absently, flipping the omelette in the pan. 

“What are you guys gonna do until then?” Natasha asked.

“I’m going on a run.” Steve informed her, scooping the omelette onto a plate which she quickly snatched from his hands. “Want to come?

“Nah.” Nat wrinkled her nose, dropping the bagel onto her plate and grabbing the butter. “Sounds boring.”

Steve sighed.

“Thor?” He asked, finally getting to making his own omelette. 

“Sure.” Thor said, following in Nat’s footsteps and looking through the pantry for something to eat. 

Maybe Steve felt a little bad about not offering him an omelette, but he was hungry and wanted to cook for himself.

“Will anyone else be joining us?” Thor asked, continuing to imitate Nat by grabbing two bagels. 

“If they want to.” Steve shrugged, getting a plate for his own breakfast.

“So, no.” Nat said through a mouthful of food as Steve took a seat across from her with his meal. “Tony and Rocket are ‘helping’ with the additions to the Milano, Bruce hates physical effort, Nebula hates _us_ , and Rhodey’s checking his suit over before we go to fight Thanos.”

Right, they were doing that tomorrow. Steve’s stomach plummeted. In less than 24 hours they would be taking off to fight the most powerful person they’d come across, and here he was eating eggs.

He felt sick.

“Are you alright?” Thor sounded concerned. 

Steve nodded, quickly shoving a forkful of eggs into his mouth. Thor took the seat next to him, having stacked both his bagels on top of each other on his plate.

“Do you want an omelette?” Steve asked, eyeing Thor’s plate.

“No, that’s alright.” Thor shook his head, picking up a whole bagel as if it were a sandwich and biting into it in a similar manner. “Thank you for the offer.”

Nat watched with wide horrified eyes. Steve couldn’t blame her, apparently they just didn’t have bagels on Asgard. 

“So,” Steve quickly tried to change the subject before Nat could jump on Thor’s ignorance of bagel-eating. “What have you been up to?”

Thor shrugged, popping the rest of the bagel into his mouth in one bite. Natasha looked ready to scream.

“Looking for the Infinity Stones mostly.” Thor admitted casually, picking at the second bagel. “ Didn’t find any though. Did find out my brother was alive, but then our father died so…”

“Sorry to hear that.” Steve said awkwardly. Loki was alive? That wasn’t good, but now didn’t seem like the right time to breach that topic.

Thor shrugged. “That was six days ago so…”

“Anyways!” He said quickly, as if trying to change the subject “Found out I had an older sister, the goddess of death, but then she took over Asgard and tried to take over the rest of the galaxy so we had to kill her.”

That seemed extreme.

“But before that she kicked me into space I landed on Sakaar and found Bruce, so that was nice.” Thor examined the top half of his bagel “And I met Valkyrie, so there’s a bright side to that.”

“Who’s Valkyrie?” Steve asked, dumbfounded. He really wasn’t sure what information to respond to here.

“Oh, her name is Brunnhilde. ” Thor clarified, making nothing more clear. “She’s lovely, she’s the last of the Valkyrie - a group of Asgards strongest female warriors- and she helped us fight our sister. Bruce helped too. And Heimdall - you haven’t met him - kept our people safe while I was away.”

“Well,” Natasha said, finishing up her meal. “Can’t wait to meet them.”

“Oh, well” Thor looked down “ I haven’t seen Valkyrie since before the snap, and Heimdall is dead.”

Steve blinked. 

“I’m…” Shit, he’d already said he was sorry to hear about Thor’s father’s death. “I’m sure Valkyrie is fine.”

“Yeah.” Thor nodded determinedly. “Yeah probably. She’s probably just helping what’s left of our people. I’m sure I’ll see her once they get here.”

“They’re… coming here?” Nat locked eyes with Steve from over Thor’s head. Why was the population of Asgard coming to earth? That was an entire planet- where was that many people supposed to stay?

“Oh, I forgot to tell you.” Thor said with a strained laugh “We had to evacuate Asgard. Destroying the planet was the only way to stop Hela from conquering the universe.”

“Why…” Steve was almost afraid to ask. “Why didn’t they come with you?”

“Thanos,” Thor went back to picking at the bagel, before waving a hand in a vague gesture. “Thanos intercepted us on our second day of travel.”

“Oh.” Steve’s stomach sank. This story didn’t seem to be getting better.

“Yeah,” Thor muttered “He slaughtered half our remaining people, Valkyrie and Korg took the survivors on a seperate ship to escape while Heimdall, Hulk, Loki and I tried to distract Thanos.”

Thor dropped his bagel back onto his plate, pushing it away from himself.

“Loki traded the tesseract with Thanos to save me, Heimdall sent Hulk back to earth so Thanos had him killed, then he killed Loki.” Thor finished.

Jesus Christ, what a shitty week. 

Steve reached out and gave Thor’s arm a sympathetic squeeze. Thor sniffed, giving a quick shrug and then grinning.

“Oh well,” He said, of his own tragedy. “At least we’ll get to kill Thanos.”

Well, that certainly was one way of looking at it.

Thor stood. “Should we go on that run?”

“Uh, sure.” Steve said, quickly grabbing his plate and putting it in the dishwasher.

He was sure Thor could use the distraction. Besides, so could he.

They’d all lost people in the past few days.

“Sure you don’t wanna come?” He asked, looking back at Natasha as he grabbed his shoes.

“Yup!” She said, throwing herself onto the couch. “Have fun.”

Steve flung open the door, stepping into the outdoors. 

He took a deep breath, there was something undeniably more clean about the air than he was used to. Probably from the clean energy sources Shuri had mentioned Wakanda using. Either way, the fresh air in his lungs was almost energizing. 

“Alright,” Steve said making off to his right. “ There’s a lake a few minutes from here, we can probably just head there.”

“Fine by me.” Thor followed from beside him. “You know midgard better than I do.”

“Not all of it.” Steve laughed. “I’ve barely been outside of America. I’ve only been in Wakanda for a day longer than you.”

Thor gave him a puzzled look. “Midgard is fairly big, you should travel more.”

“Yeah,” Steve sighed. “Maybe.”

They didn’t run into many people on their way to the lake. Like he’d told Thor, Steve hadn’t been in Wakanda for long, but it still struck him as odd. 

It was probably because over half their population had died.

It would have only been half, if Steve hadn’t gotten involved.

He shuddered, shaking his head as if to shake of the guilt settling in his stomach and curling a cold hand around his heart. It would do him no good to wallow in his mistakes. All they could do now was try to improve. 

“It’s very pretty.” Thor observed, snapping Steve out of his thoughts.

He blinked, only just realizing they’d arrived at their destination. Thor was right - something he found himself thinking consistently - it was beautiful. The water was still and clear, reflecting the mountain landscape and bright blue sky in it’s undisturbed surface. 

The lake was surrounded by vibrant green vegetation. Bushes with long leaves dipped onto the lake’s surface, the tips of the leaves almost but not quite disturbing the flat surface. Wide and tall bushes with large flat leaves grew above in a bright yellowed emerald green. A bug zipped past Steve’s ear, dipping onto the water’s surface and creating a small ripple.

It was odd, to see something so lively in the face of so much death. 

There was a trail that lead around the lake, sometimes around it’s edge but usually going through the plant life. Though, that wasn’t a bad thing. The forests in Wakanda were just as beautiful as the lakes, to Steve’s limited experience. 

Steve looked up at Thor, nodding silently towards the trail. The two took off in a slow - by Steve’s standards - run.

He was surprised at first that Thor could keep up with him. Though, he supposed it made sense, what with Thor being a debatably immortal not-god. Still, it was definitely a first. Hell, half the reason he only went on runs alone was because no one could keep up. The only time he’d really gone for a run with someone else was when he’d met Sam-

Nope. Didn’t want to think about that right now. Would really rather not think about his recently dead friend, thanks. 

Letting out an exhale through both his nose and mouth, Steve furrowed his brow and focused on the trail ahead of him - taking in the sight of the rich brown earth and snaking tree roots, observing the dappled patches of golden sunlight illuminating the path and creating a soft warm glow from between the leaves.

Steve slowed to a stop as they approached the start of their eleventh lap.

“I think that’s enough.” He panted, bending over to rest his hands on his knees. 

“Alright.” Thor agreed, not sounded half as winded as Steve felt.

Thor was smiling pleasantly, he’d probably gone easy on Steve. The bastard. 

“Alright, then.” Steve tried - and failed - to steady his breathing, straightening up into a standing position. “Good run.”

“Yes.” Thor hummed absently, squinting at the skyline. 

Steve followed his gaze, eyes locking onto what appeared to be yet another ship entering the atmosphere.

“What the hell.” He muttered, before looking back to Thor. “Are they your people?”

Thor nodded silently. “I think so.”

To their credit, they seemed to be flying in with much more control than Nebula and Tony had. 

Thor took off in a sprint in the direction of the incoming vessel. 

Great, more running. With a sigh, Steve followed behind him. 

It wasn't far, Steve slowed to stop once he saw Shuri, Okoye and the Dora Milaje at the edge of a clearing with the other Avengers - echoing Tony’s arrival so soon after. 

“It’s alright!” Thor assured them as the ship grew ever closer. “It’s just my people, there is only one fighter on board and none of them mean any harm.”

“Why is a ship full of Asgardians headed into Wakanda?” Shuri questioned, more curiosity than accusation.

“Our home was recently destroyed.” Thor replied, leaving out a great deal of the details he had shared with Steve and Natasha, before continuing on almost pleadingly. “We only need a place to rest for a few days, we can stay on the ship and then we’ll be out of your way.”

Shuri was silent, but her expression was sympathetic as her eyes followed the ship’s cautious descent all the way to it’s delicate landing. It was a circular ship - reminding Steve of a much more colourful version of the heroes spaceship in one of those space dramas Natasha had told him to watch. 

The door to the ship opened, dropping with an anti-climactic ‘thunk’ onto the grassy clearing below. 

“We mean no harm!” Came a woman’s calm voice from the ship. The woman stepped out into the clearing, arms raised in a sign of peace. She wore a light-weight and strange looking silver armor with light gold accents. “We are fleeing the destruction of our home.”

“Valkyrie!” Thor greeted her with a delighted tone, making to rush towards her before pausing - seeming to remember they were in a tense situation. 

“How many of your army are on board?” Okoye asked.

“We have no army.” Valkyrie told her. “I am the only one with battle experience on this vessel. Including myself there are sixty people on board.”

Shuri nodded at the confirmation of what Thor had said only a minute earlier.

“Your people can stay as long as you need.” She told Thor. 

“You’re lucky you landed in Wakanda.” Okoye said, walking forward to greet Valkyrie and holding out a hand for her to shake. “I’m Okoye.”

“Brunnhilde.” Valkyrie responded, shaking her hand. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

“You should thank our Queen for that.” Okoye said, fondness creeping into her tone as she gestured to Shuri.

“Call me Shuri.” Shuri walked forward, holding out a hand. “Are there any wounded on your ship?”

“A few.” Valkyrie admitted shaking her hand as well. “We narrowly escaped Thanos.”

“Is Asgardian biology very different from ours?” Shuri asked “Do you see any difficulties with us trying to treat them?”

“Essentially the same biology, but with a resistance to injury and an accelerated healing process.” Valkyrie informed her “But we have some non-asgardians aboard our vessel as well with varying differences from our own biology.”

“Bring them with me.” Shuri ordered. “I’ll see what I can do for them.”

“Thank you.” Valkyrie said, heading back into the ship to collect her people.

“How many more ships should we expect to land in Wakanda?” Okoye half-joked drily. 

“This should be the last.” Thor replied. “The last of my people are on board, and all our allies are here.”

Okoye nodded. 

Valkyrie led out a group of about fifteen people, Okoye and gestured for a few of the Dora Milaje to help her in assisting the injured. Six looked just the same as any human would, but four of them were distinctly alien. Steve was thrown for a moment, trying to imagine just how many different species of alien there were out there. None of them had ever even made contact with earth until Loki had decided to attack what seemed like ages ago.

“Excuse me.” Thor said to no one in particular, moving away from the group and rushing to help Valkyrie bring the wounded aliens with Shuri.

“Stay here.” Valkyrie stopped Thor by pacing a hand on his arm. “You should talk to the others.” 

Thor’s eyes seemed to follow the small group of wounded aliens, jaw tightening as he thought it over. He nodded, looking back at Valkyrie. “It’s good to see you.”

“You too.” She said softly, patting his arm before turning to help the injured.

Sensing Thor’s indecision, Steve quickly joined the group.

“Let me help.” He offered gently, holding out an arm to support an injured Asgardian.

“Thank you.” The man said tiredly.

The other Avengers followed his lead, Natasha and Rhodey both took an arm over their shoulders from a large purple alien that looked like it was about to collapse, while Tony supported another asgardian man. Bruce seemed to be making small talk with the Asgardian woman he was helping. Right, they probably knew each other. Even though Thor had only just told him this morning, Steve had still forgotten that Bruce had been on his way to earth with Thor and the other Asgardians when Thanos had attacked them.

Steve looked back, nodding to Thor - who shot him a grateful look - before slowly following Shuri.

“I suppose you’re one of the Avengers then?” The man asked, sounding a little dazed.

Steve sure hoped the guy didn’t die on him.

“Uh, yeah.” Steve said awkwardly. “Steve Rogers.”

“Ah.” The man said. “Yes he’s mentioned you I think, The Captain?”

“I don’t go by that anymore.” Steve chuckled “But yes.”

“I’m Svanhild.” Svanhild introduced himself. “I was a farmer.”

“Nice to meet you.” Steve said. “What did you farm?”

“I had a wonderful orchard.” Svanhild said wistfully. “We had the best oranges on Asgard.”

“Well,” Steve reassured. “I’m sure you’ll grow wonderful oranges here, too.”

The words felt hollow, and also pretty silly. But oranges was really all he knew about this man, and Steve didn’t have the heart to tell him that the world governments probably weren’t going to let a ship full of Asgardians stay - unless a particular country spoke up and gave them somewhere to settle which well… Steve didn’t find that likely.

“Okay.” Shuri announced. “Okoye, take the Asgardians who are in the worst shape to the hospital.”

Okoye nodded, she scanned the group gesturing for six of the asgardians to follow her.

“The rest of you come to my lab.” Shuri ordered, leading the way.

Once they’d arrived in the lab she tapped one of her Kimoyo beads, speaking authoritatively into it. “I need help from anyone available with medical or first aid experience, or any biology graduates and medical students.”

“We can help.” Rhodey said, gesturing to himself and Tony.

“Me too.” Bruce raised his hand timidly, like a highschooler only half certain of the answer they were about to give their teacher.

“Alright.” Shuri nodded. “The rest of you, help everyone down and then leave my lab.”

Steve helped Svanhild into a sitting position on one of the chairs in the lab. 

“You’ll be fine.” Steve assured him. “She’s the best scientist on Midgard.”

He hoped using their term for earth would bring him a sense of comfort.

“Thank you.” Svanhild said sincerely. “I’m sure I will be.”

Steve gave him a tight smile, before leaving the lab. He stood in the hallway, taking a deep breath. 

Man, this felt familiar.

“Something tells me this will take longer than yesterday.” Natasha commented drily. 

Brunnhilde came to join them in the hallway, giving each of them an assessing look. 

“I’m Steve.” Steve said quickly, holding out a hand. “This is Natasha, and Tony and Rhodey are the two men in there.”

“I’m Brunnhilde.” She said simply, not taking his hand. “Are you Thor’s midgardian friends?”

Thor’s midgardian friends.

“That’s us.” Steve said awkwardly, dropping his hand to his side.

“Hm.” She sounded disinterested. 

“You must be tired-” Steve started.

“Not really.” She cut him off, staring at the door to the lab.

Just as Steve ran out of things to say to break the silence, Queen Ramonda rushed past pushing into the lab. Followed closely by ten other men and women - four of them seemed fairly young to Steve, he supposed they must be students.

“It’s probably going to take them a while.” Natasha observed once they’d disappeared through the lab doors. “You should rest or get something to eat while you wait.”

“No.” Valkyrie said. “Someone needs to stay here in case something goes wrong.”

“Bruce is with them.” Steve pointed out. “He’s known them for about as long, right?”

“Bruce doesn’t know much about Asgardians.” Valkyrie countered. “Plus, he was Hulk most of the time.”

Steve sighed, it didn’t sound like she could be convinced. He made eye contact with Natasha, who raised her eyebrows and shrugged in a ‘well what can you do’ sort of manner.

“Are you hungry?” Steve asked “I can at least get you something to eat or drink while you wait.”

She opened her mouth as if to say no, before pausing. 

“That would be nice.” She said carefully. “I don’t suppose you have any alcohol that would be effective for an Asgardian.”

“Afraid not.” Steve informed her grimly, thinking on his own struggles with his formerly-newfound inability to get drunk.

“Damn.” She muttered.

“I can get you a sandwich though.” Steve offered weakly.

“Alright.” She sighed, leaning against the wall.

Steve nodded an awkward goodbye, before turning down the hall to leave.

Thank god she’d said yes, he really did not want to be there. With the only two people who knew Valkyrie currently occupied, trying to make conversation with her felt impossibly awkward.

To be fair, Steve supposed she’d probably had a pretty rough few days. What with the destruction of her home followed by an attack from Thanos. She was entitled to a lack of social enthusiasm. 

Making his way from the lab to the hotel, he ran into a frantic looking Thor.

“You alright?” He asked

“Yes, yes.” Thor nodded, not exactly looking at Steve. “Everything’s fine the people are all settled. How are they?”

“Hm?” Steve asked.

“The people you helped bring with Shuri?” Thor clarified.

“They should be fine.” Steve told him. “The worst of them are at the hospital, but Shuri and some other scientists are working on the rest.”

Thor nodded again, biting his lips - brow knit.

“They didn’t seem to be in too bad shape.” Steve reassured. “And Shuri knows what she’s doing, they should be fine in no time. Valkyrie is waiting with them now.”

“Right, right.” Thor said absently. “I should…”

He trailed off, clearly torn between what he should do. 

Steve could see why, what with his people newly arriving on a strange planet after two separate devastating attacks, it wasn’t very convenient to have them in three separate places with only one familiar person who at least knew something about the planet they were on. There really wasn’t any right place for Thor to be, all three groups needed someone familiar there.

“I should bring the news to my people.” Thor said uncertainly.

Steve nodded in encouragement. 

“I’m just gonna bring Valkyrie something to eat, but how about after that I go wait at the hospital and let you know of any updates?” Steve offered. 

“Thank you.” Thor sounded relieved. 

“Don’t worry about it.” Thor definitely had enough to worry about already.

Steve took off in the direction of the hotel, a little quicker now. He half-jogged through the lobby and up the stairs, throwing open the door to their hotel room. Speed-walking into the kitchen he grabbed some bread and some peanut butter from the cabinet, before pausing and putting it back in the pantry - he didn’t know if peanut allergies were a thing on Asgard. 

Instead he elected to grab some ham, lettuce and cheese from the fridge. He assembled the sandwich quickly, grabbing a small plastic bag to put it in. 

Sandwich successfully made, he exited the hotel and near sprinted back to Shuri’s lab.

He was getting quite the workout today. 

“Here you go.” He said somewhat breathlessly once he’d arrived, handing the sandwich to Valkyrie.

“Thanks.” She said simply, taking the sandwich and giving him a funny look. “Did you run here?”

“Yeah.” He nodded, hands on his hips as he tried to catch his breath. He then turned to address her and Natasha. “I’m gonna head to the hospital to give Thor updates if anything happens.”

“Good idea.” Natasha said. “Do you have any way to contact him?”

“Uh,” Steve blinked, he hadn’t thought of that. “No.”

“I’ll come with you then.” She said. “So we’ll still have someone there if we need to get Thor.”

“You alright with that?” Steve asked Valkyrie.

“Fine by me.” She waved them off, holding half the sandwich in her other hand. “Do what you want.”

“Alright then.” Steve said. “Uh, welcome to earth I guess?”

Valkyrie snorted. “Thanks.”

Steve nodded to Natasha, and the two took off.

Steve didn’t actually know where the hospital was. Lucky for him, it seemed Natasha had had the good sense to figure that out their first day in Wakanda.

“Can I help you?” The receptionist asked politely.

“Uh,” Steve said “We’re here for um… any updates on the Asgardians that were brought here.”

“Thor sent us.” Natasha clarified.

“We’ll let you know.” The receptionist said simply. 

Steve thanked her before going to sit on one of the chairs in the waiting room. Natasha took the chair to his left.

“Eventful day, huh?” She asked conversationally.

“I guess.” Steve replied. “Not the most eventful one this week though.”

“No.” Natasha said, staring off at an unspecified spot on the wall.

“What are we even going to do with the timestone?” Steve asked her. 

“We need to get it first.” Natasha reminded him. “I think that’s what Shuri wants to talk to us about later today.”

If that meeting even went ahead. Shuri would probably be exhausted by the time she was even ready to have the meeting. She was only a teenager, and now thanks to Thanos she was being forced into a position where she had to act twice her age.

Steve had never been so thankful to not be leading a country.

“I mean,” Natasha continued, tone a little goofy. “I’m guessing we’re _probably_ gonna use it to go back in time.”

“No shit.” Steve snorted, elbowing her

Natasha chuckled in response.

“But how far back do you think?” Steve asked. “I mean… there’s a lot of stuff we’d all like to fix.”

Lagos, mainly.

Natasha gave him a searching look before dropping back against her chair with a sigh.

“I don’t think they’re gonna want to go to far back.” She admitted. “We’re gonna want to avoid as many problems as possible. Time travel can get pretty messy.”

“Have you got some secret time travelling experience you’re not telling me about?” Steve teased.

“You’d never know if I did.” Natasha replied confidently. 

“That’s true.” Steve admitted.

He turned to look back at the desk. The receptionist seemed unbothered, almost like she was waiting for a lunch break.

What was it like, he wondered, to work somewhere that people regularly brought dying loved ones. Somewhere that had tragedies and miracles daily. Steve only ever saw the initial action behind an injury or death, the receptionist saw the consequences.

He supposed you must get used to it after a while. He wondered if she ever went home some days desperate to forget the events she’d seen at work. 

He wondered if she went home to a family, or a partner. He wondered if they helped her get through it, helped her forget the worst and remember the best.

He wondered if instead she threw herself into her work, or any work she could find, hoping desperately that the routine actions would block out the memories - slowly drifting farther and farther away from her family and friends.

Or maybe being a hospital receptionist wasn’t quite that dramatic. Maybe he was over-thinking things. 

Natasha fell asleep with her head on his shoulder, mumbling for him to wake her up if there was an update.

There was, eventually. Two hours later, to be exact.

Steve nudged Natasha awake and stood as a professional looking doctor approached.

“Everyone’s fine.” She assured them. “We’re going to need to keep an eye on them for a day or two, but they should be feeling better in no time.”

“Really?” Natasha asked, shocked. “All of them?”

It did seem unlikely, though Steve was learning not to question the amount of miracles coming out of science in Wakanda.

“Yes, really.” The doctor repeated.

“That’s great.” Steve said. “Thank you so much.”

“Are they taking visitors?” Natasha asked.

“Yes.” The doctor replied.

“Okay.” Natasha turned to Steve. “I’m gonna go see them in case they have questions, do you wanna get Thor?”

Fuck, more running.

“Yeah, good plan.” Steve nodded.

He quickly thanked the doctor and then turned to leave. 

There was no way he was going to be out of shape after all the running he’d been doing in this one endless day. 

Thor was in the newly arrived ship, exactly where Steve had thought he’d be. Though, Steve was surprised to see Svanhild and the other injured new arrivals present though. 

He really had to stop being so surprised by the miracles Shuri seemed to pull off daily. 

At Steve’s arrival onto the ship, everyone’s heads seemed to shoot up - looking imploringly to Steve for any news of their hurt friends. Even Valkyrie, who had been sitting on the floor next to Thor, seemed anxious to hear what Steve had come to say.

Thor stood and approached Steve, eyes searching and brow knit in concern. 

“Everyone’s fine.” Steve reassured him. “The doctors just need to keep an eye on them for a few days, but they’re confident that the five of them will be fine.”

Thor sighed with relief, shoulders visibly losing their tension. 

“Thank you.” He said sincerely.

“Don’t mention it.” Steve replied. “They are taking visitors if you want to see them, Natasha is with them now just in case.”

“Alright.” Thor clapped Steve on the shoulder, smiling. “I’ll be down there in a moment.”

Thor turned to the rest of the ship, repeating what Steve had already told him.

“Would any of you like to visit?” Thor asked his fellow asgardians. 

“They probably won’t want too many visitors at once.” Steve hurried to add, deciding to cut off that issue before it started.

A few people volunteered. Family or close friends, Steve had to assume.

“Alright.” Thor clapped his hands together. “I will take you down to visit.”

Thor turned to Valkyrie. “Would you mind keeping an eye on things here while I’m gone?”

“Go ahead.” Valkyrie waved a hand at him nonchalantly. 

Thor nodded to her, before turning to Steve.

Steve looked back blankly. 

“I,” Thor admitted. “Don’t know where the hospital is.”

Oh, of course.

“I’ll take you.” Steve said, gesturing for the other asgardians to follow him.

At this point, Steve was going to have the path from this clearing to the hospital clear in his memory long past the day he died. He’d remember it better than he’d remember his own name. 

They entered the hospital with surprisingly little commotion for a group of aliens previously assumed to be norse gods. Thor talked quickly and politely to the receptionist and shot Steve another grateful look before disappearing down the hallway with the rest of the asgardians.

Well, that had been an eventful and unforeseen three hours. Steve nodded awkwardly to the receptionist before turning to leave.

He briefly considered just sitting back down in the waiting room chairs and falling asleep, before deciding that was probably rude.

He took his time on the walk back to the hotel, relieved to finally not be in a rush to go somewhere. He had the opportunity to take the time to enjoy his surroundings and by god he was going to use it. 

Unlocking the door to the hotel with a groan, Steve kicked off his shoes sloppily in the porch before collapsing on the couch. 

He was sure he’d only just closed his eyes when he woke up to Tony shaking his shoulder.

“Shuri wants to meet with all of us.” Tony explained.

Steve blinked at him, dragging his hand down his face to clear away his exhaustion. 

“Alright.” Steve pulled himself off the couch with a sigh. “Let’s go then.”

“Done with your nap, grandpa?” Natasha called from the porch.

“Ha ha.” Steve muttered sarcastically, pulling on his shoes.

She chuckled, clearly pleased with herself. 

“How’d it go with the injured asgardians?” Steve asked, directing the question at Rhodey, Bruce, and Tony all at once.

“Well, they all lived.” Rhodey said. “So, that’s a win.”

“Yeah, pretty uneventful honestly.” Tony pulled a coat that Steve was almost positive belonged to Rhodey over his shoulder. “Which is good for anything medical.”

“It’s pretty interesting though.” Rhodey pondered, opening the door. “They’re biology is pretty much identical to a human’s.”

“At least what we saw, yeah.” Bruce agreed as the group stepped outside.

“That’s pretty neat.” Steve said.

He didn’t really see how it was though. Pretty much every alien they’d seen looked human, why was it weird that they shared biology? 

Probably a science graduate thing. Steve had never been big on science. 

He wondered briefly what field he would have gone into if he had grown up in this century - if he hadn’t joined the military.

Shuri was waiting for them in the same room as yesterday. Nebula and Rocket where already seated. Though, seated was a generous word. Nebula was sitting as close to the door as possibly, perched on the edge of her seat as if about to leap into action. 

Rocket on the other hand was sitting on Shuri’s left side, chatting excitedly to her about tech - a lot of very fast confusing words Steve had no hope of understanding - while Okoye, with Nakia seated next to her, gave the not-raccoon an odd look from Shuri’s right side.

“Look who decided to show up.” Valkyrie sounded almost like she was teasing them. She was sitting next to Thor, her head had been leaning on his shoulder and her arm was linked with his - though she quickly pulled it away as soon as Steve noticed.

Bruce immediately sat at her available side. 

“Well we figured we had nothing better to do.” Tony replied, taking the empty seat next to Bruce - pulling Rhodey into the seat next to him by their clasped hands.

Weird, Steve hadn’t noticed they’d been holding hands.

Steve took the seat next to Nebula, who’s eyes immediately shot in his direction - wild and evaluating. He gave her a smile that felt more like a grimace. 

Natasha sat on Steve’s other side, meeting Nebula’s gaze with an evaluating one of her own. 

“So,” Shuri started. “You probably all know why you’re here.” 

“To talk strategy.” Natasha replied. “Make a plan of how we’re going to get and use the Time Stone, and what we do once we do.”

“Exactly.” Shuri said. “So first, who is going to use it?”

Steve blinked, looking around the room.

“Can’t anyone?” He asked

“We don’t know that for sure.” Nebula told him. 

“It’s possible,” Shuri elaborated. “Since it’s one of the less physically strainful Stones, but there’s always a chance that it won’t respond to someone who wouldn’t be able to handle one of the other Infinity Stones - or if it’s proximity to the other Stones will make it stronger and more difficult to use.”

“Also, since it’s a magical object the mental strain would be pretty heavy for someone who has little to no experience with magic.” Valkyrie added

Steve nodded.

“Thor could do it.” Rocket suggested. “I mean, he already uses a pretty crazy magical weapon, so clearly the guys got experience.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time I dealt with an Infinity Stone.” Thor admitted. “And I was able to survive direct contact with the Power Stone.”

Nebula’s eyebrows shot up, clearly impressed.

“I mean, me too, it’s no big deal.” Rocket muttered, being subjected to the same sense of inferiority everyone who talked to Thor inevitably experienced. The guy had an ego, but it was well earned and mostly harmless.

“Well, I guess that solves that then.” Shuri said. “Honestly, I thought that was going to be the hardest part.”

“So next we just need to figure out how far back to go.” Rhodey said.

“Preferably before Thanos has too many infinity stones.” Valkyrie said. “We’re still going to have to fight him, so it should be when he’s weaker.”

“Can’t we just go back before he has any of them?” Bruce asked.

Valkyrie shook her head. “The farther back we go, the greater the risk we cause a time paradox later on.”

“So how far back do we go?” Rhodey asked. “I mean, at what point does the risk become too great?”

“We don’t know.” Nebula said. “As far as we know, no one has successfully tried this yet.”

“Great.” Tony muttered. “Well that’s encouraging.”

“I think we’re asking the wrong question.” Shuri interjected. “We should be asking what we plan to do once we go back, once we know that it should be much simpler to figure out when we need to start.”

Natasha nodded. “Makes sense, so what do we wanna do?”

“Destroy the Infinity Stones obviously.” Nebula replied. “If we get just one then Thanos’ whole plan falls apart.”

“We did destroy one.” Steve pointed out. “We destroyed the Mind Stone, Thanos just undid it all with the Time Stone.”

“So we destroy the Time Stone before he can get it.” Rhodey announced. “He can’t turn back time without the Time Stone.”

“What about the Reality Stone?” Shuri asked. “I mean, theoretically he could use that to create a reality where the Time Stone hasn’t been destroyed.”

These damn stones. There was no reason for something that powerful to exist.

“In theory.” Nebula agreed grimly. “But that won’t be a problem if we kill him.”

“I hit him with an axe in the heart.” Thor informed her grimly. “It did nothing, I doubt the answer is that simple.”

“That should’ve worked.” Tony objected. “I mean, there’s no way that that shouldn’t have worked. The guy has a heart right?”

“Physically.” Nebula muttered.

“So we should assume that as long as he has them the Infinity Stones prevent him from dying then.” Shuri reasoned. “So the obvious answer is that we need to destroy both the Time Stone and the Reality Stone within a short period of time.”

“Wait, do you even have a way of destroying the Infinity Stones?” Nebula asked. “It’s not that easy, lots of people have tried before and no one has been able to.”

“We have a team member, Wanda,” Steve told her, kicking himself for using the present tense. “She was given powers from the Mind Stone - that’s how we were able to destroy the Mind Stone the first time around.”

“Yeah, okay that should work then.” Rocket said. “But how are we gonna get the Reality and Time Stones before Thanos does?”

Fuck, there was that.

“The Time Stone will be on earth.” Tony replied. “Which means we can get to that one before Thanos, and Wanda can destroy it before he gets here.”

“Where on earth?” Shuri asked.

“New York.” Tony answered. “With Dr. Strange, he came to see me right before we got taken off earth in that spaceship.”

“So we’ll need to get to Strange before that ship shows up then.” Bruce reasoned

“When did it show up?” Nakia asked

“Three days ago.” Tony replied.

“So we need to go back four days at least.” Nakia decided.

“I don’t think we should go back any further than five days.” Shuri said. “Too much could go wrong down the line.”

“Wait, this is all assuming we’ll be able to remember.” Okoye interrupted. “If we don’t remember these past four days, the plan completely falls apart.”

“We should be able to remember.” Nebula told her. “From what I’ve heard while tracking down the Stones for Thanos, the person who uses the Time Stone and anyone within a ten foot radius should keep their memories, within reason - they’re just sent back to where they were at the time they travel to.”

“Within reason?” Natasha pressed.

“Well,” Nebula explained “If you go back two years, you’re not going to remember every detail. And I mean… no one dead will keep their memories, even if their in the ten foot radius.”

“Great,” Tony replied. “So all we need to do is not die.”

“But how are we going to get the Reality Stone?” Rocket asked. “We tried three days ago, and Thanos was already there.”

“You’ll have some extra time.” Thor said. “You might be able to beat him there.”

“Not if Thanos keeps his memories.” Nakia said. “He’ll probably guess that our plan involves getting the Stones before him.”

“There’s a chance.” Valkyrie replied. “If we go back four days ago, he’ll be on the way to our ship to get the Tesseract.”

Thor blinked at that, seeming to realize something.

“How do we know that he won’t try to get the Reality Stone first once he realizes what's going on?” Rocket asked.

“We don’t.” Thor replied. “But if myself or Valkyrie keep our memories, he’ll know that we’re going to try and stop him from getting the Tesseract.”

“So he’d probably keep headed for us.” Valkyrie reasoned.

“The smartest course of action would be to take the Tesseract from you and use it to travel to where the Reality Stone is.” Nakia said. “That way he wouldn’t have to give up one of the Stones for the other.”

Sound reasoning. Steve’s eyebrows shot up - impressed she’d thought of such an airtight solution so quickly.

“Well, that’s pretty damn inconvenient.” Rocket replied. “Since that means we can’t stop him from getting either of the Stones.”

“There’s a chance he won’t think of it.” Steve said. “We should still try to stop him from getting one of them.”

“The Reality Stone should be the priority.” Okoye decided. “It poses a greater risk.”

“I mean,” Rocket shrugged. “I can try to take the guardians to get the Reality Stone before Thanos gets it, but that means we won’t be there to help if something goes wrong with you.”

He addressed the final part to Thor.

“We’ll be fine.” Thor assured him. “Thanos won’t have the element of surprise this time around, we’ll be ready for him.”

“Alright then.” Rocket decided. “We’ll try to get the Reality Stone, and then we’ll come back to see if you need help.”

“And once you get the Reality Stone, bring it to us.” Steve said. “Wanda will destroy it.”

“Thanos won’t stop.” Nebula warned. “Even if you destroy the Infinity Stones, he’s still going to keep killing. He’ll destroy your planet next, as retribution.”

“We’ll deal with that when it happens.” Steve assured. “First we need to make it harder to kill us all.”

“Besides, I thought you were going to kill him.” Rocket almost sounded teasing. “How can he kill us all if he’s dead.”

“Even if I kill him before we turn back time, he’ll still be alive in the past.” Nebula pointed out.

“Well, when he gets here you can always kill him then.” Tony offered. “Seems like the only way to stop him anyways.”

“Yes.” Nebula said unevenly. “But when we turn back time his minions will be torturing me on one of his ships.”

She what? Why the hell hadn’t she mentioned that earlier?

“What.” Natasha stated it more than asking.

Nebula shrugged. “I can’t kill him if I can’t escape.” 

“I don’t think that’s what she’s surprised by.” Rocket said, staring at her with wide eyes.

“Oh, yeah.” Nebula picked at her thumb. “I snuck on his ship a while ago to kill him. Almost did this time, but he caught me. Used me as bait for-.”

She clenched both hands tight around each other. “Never mind.”

Steve stared at her. She’d escape torture only a few days ago, and had been about to silently go back to it. 

Nebula had never struck him as selfless, so what the hell was more important to her than her own life?

“We’ll come get you.” Rocket said, face mirroring the concern Steve felt. “Where are you going to be?”

“I,” Nebula furrowed her brow. “I’m not sure. I sent a message to M- your ship, can you find the location there.”

“I should be able to.” Rocket nodded. 

“Rocket.” Nebula hesitated. “Don’t let Gamora go with you.”

“I don’t think I’m going to have a choice.” Rocket said. “She’s gonna be on the ship.”

“You can’t let her get off it then.” Nebula said firmly. “Thanos needs her to get the Soul Stone. He-”

Her voice broke. She closed her eyes, nostrils flaring and brow furrowing in annoyance before she opened them again. 

“He’ll kill her again.” She finished.

Steve felt suddenly like he was an intruder, an outsider peering in on someone else's tragedy.

He felt even worse for wishing they’d just stop talking about it.

A look of understanding came across Rocket’s face, he nodded. “Alright.”

“So,” Tony interrupted the brief moment. Steve thanked him in his head for the distraction. “Just to clarify. Our plan is to go back six days, get Wanda to Strange and destroy the Time Stone. Meanwhile The Guardians will get the Reality Stone and bring it here for Wanda to destroy. Then we fight Thanos when he gets here?”

Shuri nodded. “You should destroy them within a small window of time, we don’t want Thanos to have the opportunity to use one to reverse the destruction of the other.”

“Got it.” Tony said. “One last question, where should we destroy them?”

“Doesn’t matter.” Steve replied. “As long as we destroy them.”

“No, it matters.” Nakia said. “Wherever you destroy the Stones is where Thanos is going to attack. He’s going to try and take them back.”

Right. 

“Are we not just going to do it here again?” Natasha asked. “I mean, this place does have the best shields.”

Steve sucked in a breath. He had been wondering the same thing, but he didn’t want to repeat his previous mistake of taking advantage of T’Challa’s generosity and putting Wakanda in danger.

“You want to put our people in the line of fire again?” Okoye asked her. “After all the people who have already died for your friend? After the kindness we’ve shown you?”

“We can not just sit back and allow Thanos to slaughter half the planet.” Nakia argued. “This is bigger than just Wakanda and the Avengers.”

“The last time they brought the fight to Wakanda, half our warriors were killed so they could save _one_ of their friends - an android who was begging to be sacrificed instead!” Okoye responded. 

“This is different.” Nakia said. “They are not asking us to lay our lives down to save just one of their own. This is to save _half_ the _universe_ \- our people included. The safest place to have the fight is here, Wakanda’s defenses have the best chance at stalling Thanos long enough to destroy the Infinity Stones. To not get involved would be cruel, we would be placing the lives of our warriors over the lives of half the universe - we would be repeating their mistake of putting our people in danger to save one of their own.”

Again Steve was struck with the feeling that he was intruding, as well as additional guilt over his mistakes being so openly discussed.

“But bringing the fight here puts our civilians in danger.” Okoye argued. “We know Thanos will try to wipe out our planet out of anger if we do succeed and we would be placing him immediately next to defenseless civilians, hospitals, nursing homes, schools. Yes, we should help in the fight against him, but we should not carelessly put the lives of defenseless civilians in Thanos path of destruction. ”

“You’re both right.” Shuri interrupted. “We can not sit back and allow Thanos to wipe out half the population, but we also can’t involve our civilians in this fight.”

“So what do you think we should do?” Okoye asked.

“We evacuate the area around the Royal Palace,” Shuri decided. “We bring the fight here, and then activate the barrier - containing the fight within the area.”

“You will have to discuss this with the council beforehand.” Okoye warned.

“I fully intend too.” Shuri said. “Do I have your support?”

There was a pause, the look Shuri gave Okoye was reserved but her eyes betrayed her uncertainty. Okoye sighed, placing a reassuring hand on the teenage Queen’s shoulder.

“Yes.” She replied at last. “Of course.”

Shuri smiled, reaching up and giving the hand on her shoulder a quick squeeze before Okoye removed it.

“Well then that’s settled.” Shuri said decisively, addressing the rest of the room.“You can bring the Infinity Stones here along with anyone willing to fight Thanos and his army.”

“So now we know what we’re going to do once we get the Time Stone from Thanos.” Bruce said. “But how are we going to actually get it? What’s the plan there?”

“We take the Milano to where Thanos is, I attack, Thor grabs the Time Stone, then we’re done.” Nebula said simply.

“You have to know it’s not going to be that easy.” Rhodey said. “We’ve got to figure out the logistics of the plan.”

Nebula shrugged.

“It should be a stealth mission for as long as possible.” Natasha said. “We shouldn’t give him any time to escape or pull something with one of the Infinity Stones.”

“Or fight back.” Steve added. 

He had the distinct feeling that if they fought with Thanos, the plan would fall apart. It hadn’t gone so spectacularly the last time they’d fought.

“Plus we’re going to need to get everyone in the ten foot radius, and keep Thanos out of it.” Rhodey pointed out.

“Without dying.” Rocket added. 

‘I mean, that goes without saying.” Valkyrie replied. “Ideally ‘not dying’ would be the general unspoken rule.”

Ideally.

“If Thanos is where you think he is,” Nakia addressed Nebula. “Do you know the layout of where he’ll be staying? Or if anyone will be with him.”

“I was too young when he took us there to remember much.” Nebula said uncertainly, squinting as if remembering some distant memory. “It’s… a farm area, I think. Big empty field of wheat, something stupid like that. I don’t think anyone will be there - it’s one of the planets that fell apart after he killed half their population.”

“And he thinks he can retire there?” Rhodey sounded incredulous.

“He thinks a lot of things for a stupid bastard.” Nebula replied bluntly. 

Rocket snorted. 

“So, if we fight him outdoors it’ll be open terrain - but if there hasn’t been a harvest the crops should offer cover.” Okoye said.

“As long as we move carefully.” Nakia agreed. “We don’t want to disturb the crops too much an alert him to our presence.”

“I doubt he’ll be keeping the Infinity Gauntlet outside in a field though.” Valkyrie said. “It’s probably going to be hidden somewhere in his house.”

“Well in that case let's hope he’ll be outside when we get there.” Thor said gravely. 

Steve doubted it was going to be that simple.

“So we get there, locate the Gauntlet, grab the Time Stone, and then head to four days ago.” Tony said. “So who’s going?”

“If it’s a stealth mission we don’t want too many people.” Nakia replied. 

“But we’ll also need to send enough people to hold him off in case he attacks before we can access the Time Stone.” Okoye added.

“So, who do we absolutely need to send?” Shuri asked. “Obviously Nebula since she knows how to find Thanos’ hiding places, Rocket because he’ll be the only one with the Guardians when we go back, one of the Avengers so that they can bring Wanda here, and… who’s going to be in New York six days ago?”

Steve looked around the room. Nebula and Rocket would be in space. Himself, Natasha, and Rhodey would all be in Europe. Bruce, Thor, and Valkyrie would be on the ship with the Asgardians heading to earth. Shuri and Okoye would be in Wakanda. Nakia would be wherever her mission had been, he didn’t really know the details.

“Just me.” Tony replied.

“So Tony as well then.” Shuri said. “And I will go so we have someone from Wakanda.”

“Absolutely not.” Okoye replied. “Wakanda has just lost it’s king, we can not lose you too.”

“I can’t just sit here while everyone else goes off to fight Thanos!” Shuri objected.

“You can, and will.” Okoye told her firmly. “Wakanda needs you here now more than ever.”

“Thanos killed my brother.” Shuri argued. “You have to let me help.”

“And how do you expect me to explain to your mother that now he might kill you too?” Okoye demanded. “Hasn’t she lost enough?”

Shuri was silent, taking a breath and looking down.

“Shuri,” Okoye said gently, placing her hand on Shuri’s shoulder once more and trying to make eye contact. “You have already helped, you have shared your stealth technology with these people to use against Thanos, you have given them a place to stay and healed their injured. You need to help Wakanda now, get us through this tragedy until we can undo it.”

“But how can I discuss our plans with the council if I don’t remember them?” Shuri countered weakly.

“You won’t have too.” Nakia pointed out, reaching out and taking one of Shuri’s hands. “T’Challa will. Send me on this mission, I will remember and tell you and T’Challa the plans.”

Shuri sighed, before nodding and shaking of both their hands. “Alright, I suppose it makes sense to send you on a stealth mission anyways - you are a spy.”

“It is my area of expertise.” Nakia smiled gently. 

“We should send at least one or two more people from each group.” Valkyrie said. “In case Thanos attacks, we want enough people to hold him off - and enough people to send back, in case… you know.”

They sure did. Though, Steve was pretty sure everyone on this mission had accepted the fact that they might die - some of them probably to an alarming degree.

“Well, there will only be the three of us on the Statesman.” Thor said, more to the group than Valkyrie. “The rest of my people do not have battle experience.”

“Alright,” Shuri said. “So you, Bruce, and Valkyrie will go. Which only leaves three other Avengers, since we do not have time to wait for Hawkeye, and Tony will be going anyways.”

“Problem.” Rocket said. “I’m the only guardian left, and no one else is going to be in New York with Tony.”

That was a problem, and a big one. If they pulled this off, the Guardians and Tony were the two key players in the plan. Without Rocket and Tony to remember that they needed to get the Infinity Stones and bring them to Wanda, this whole plan would fall apart.

“Guess we’ll just have to not die then.” Tony said flippantly. 

“Tony, this is serious.” Steve warned. “We need you and Rocket to remember, or we won't be able to get the Time Stone and Reality Stone before Thanos.”

“I’m aware.” Tony snapped. 

“I don’t think there is anything we can do about that.” Shuri said, sounding troubled. “Unfortunately we just don’t have the time to find someone else who will be in New York.”

“No worries, we’ll just do our best to not die this time.” Tony joked.

It really wasn’t funny.

“I will go with Nakia then.” Okoye said, moving on. “Ayo can take my place with the Dora Milaje for now.”

Shuri nodded. “I suppose we don’t have time to find a third person either.”

“That’s fine.” Nakia said. “We’re already pushing it with the group size for a stealth mission.”

“Alright then,” Shuri said. “I think that’s everything.”

“When should we leave?” Steve asked.

Shuri bit her lip - clearly in thought. 

“I’d like to give you more time to rest.” She admitted. “But I don’t think we have the time, we don’t want to use the Time Stone to go back farther than a week. Rocket estimates that it will take half a day to get there, and we should leave lots of time for error.” 

“So,” Steve said. “A few hours then?”

Shuri nodded. “I hate to ask, but is everyone alright with leaving in three hours?”

Steve sucked in a breath, looking to the others. Natasha nodded, Rhodey shrugged - Tony imitated the gesture.

“Should be enough time.” Steve replied, the rest of the group standing to leave.

“It should be.” Thor said, as he stood. “Just let me check on my people before we go.”

“Actually,” Shuri said. “Can I come with you? I would like to meet them since they’re staying here - make sure everything is alright.”

“Of course.” Thor replied, offering her his arm.

She grinned at the gesture, taking the arm and leaving with him. Okoye exchanged a look with Nakia, both shrugging as Okoye made to go with them.

“Well,” Natasha said, looking down at Steve. “I guess that’s that.”

“Guess so.” Steve replied, standing as well. “What should we do until then?”

Natasha shrugged. “Could take a nap.”

Steve snorted, that wasn’t likely. 

“Yeah.” Natasha agreed. “Lets just head back to the hotel and grab whatever we’ll need to bring with us.”

“Alright.” Steve said, letting her lead him out the door. 

Rhodey and Tony had apparently had a similar idea. Both men had gotten to the hotel before Steve and Natasha, and were thoroughly examining their armor. Rhodey was poking at Tony’s empty but activated bleeding edge armor - looking for any cracks or weak spots, while Tony was examining the cannons on Rhodey’s armor.

“Mine should be fine,” Tony told Rhodey, leaning over and deactivating the empty suit. “Wanna help me update yours before we leave?”

“Sure.” Rhodey sighed, clearly displeased with Tony’s casual disregard for checking his own armor.

Steve gave them a casual wave before heading to his room to grab whatever he need to pack.

It wasn’t much. Actually, aside from his suit and updated shields, it wasn’t anything. Steve sighed and sat on his bed. Right now, he’d just have to be satisfied with a shield and a plan. 

He hoped that was enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, any feedback is appreciated!

**Author's Note:**

> Any and all feedback appreciated! Tell me what you hated, what you liked, or nothing at all! It's like a choose your own adventure.
> 
> This fic isn't a Tony fic, these two are just the farthest physically from the other avengers so I had to get them back before anything else can happen.


End file.
